I'm The Wrong That You Like
by Tear Of A Clown
Summary: After his sister is assaulted one night, Brendan is out for blood, and he'll do anything to get it. Ste's older brother is accused of a heinous crime, and he will stand by him till the very end, because he swears he didn't do it. But then Brendan and Ste meet, and everything isn't as black and white as it first seemed. AU.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: This story is loosely based on a book I read a while back, and I found myself thinking what would Stendan do in this situation. So this is my rendition. Hope you enjoy and review.

Oh and a quick thank you to PrayForTheLight. She convinced me to write this in the first place :)

**Chapter 1**

Brendan carried his shopping basket full of chocolates and snacks and ready made meals to the cashier, but he still hadn't picked up the item he came into price slice for in the first place. To be honest, he didn't even know what brand or type to get, and the humiliation of needing to ask someone for help, was making a flush of red crawl up his neck.

He settled the basket in front of him and cleared his throat once. Cindy was busy filing her nails, so he cleared his throat again and she looked up, immediately looking uncomfortable. That's how everyone looked at him now, like they should say something comforting, but would rather be trampled by a herd of elephants; the elephants that always occupied a room when Brendan was in it.

"Cindy…" Brendan cleared his throat again and clicked his neck like he was preparing for battle, in some sense he was; he was battling his urge to run. "Cheryl. She…erm…she needs… well it's her time of the month, and I don't really know…" He didn't continue, he couldn't when Cindy was looking at him like she found him being uncomfortable incredibly hilarious, but didn't know if it was appropriate to laugh.

She managed to compose herself and stood up straight, "does she use sanitary towels or tampons?"

What the fuck? How was Brendan supposed to know that, it's not like he settled down with Cheryl on her bed and talked about her period while he painted her toenails. This was ludicrous, he should have left this village weeks ago, he shouldn't be out shopping for fucking sanitary towels and tampons.

"I don't know Cindy; can you just give one of the best of each and bag the rest of this up?"

Brendan waited at the front as Cindy went to the appropriate shelves and returned with the items. There was only silence between them as she scanned everything and put them in bags for him. It was only when he was leaving the shop did Cindy speak up again. She spoke of something that had been playing on his mind, but he dared not voice it, voicing it made it all the more real.

"It's good though, isn't it? That she's on her period." Cindy had the decency to look uneasy.

"Excuse me?" Brendan knew exactly where she was going with this.

"I'm just saying, if she's on her period, that means she's not… you know."

"No, I don't know, Cindy." He did, but they do say ignorance is bliss.

"You know what, forget it."

"No, but Cindy, you have me curious. What is good about any of this? What is good about my sister barely being able to leave her bedroom to buy the simplest necessities? Enlighten me." Brendan hadn't even realised that he had walked back to the cashier's desk, and was snarling in Cindy's face.

Cindy swallowed and spoke in one breath, the quicker she got the words out, the quicker Brendan would have to leave. "If she's on her period, it means she's not pregnant." There it was.

Brendan knew this should've been a relief. His sister wouldn't have to deal with a constant reminder of had happened to her. With their Catholic beliefs, an abortion would've been out of the question for her, and a baby; the product of her pain, would've driven her to insanity. However, the relief wasn't as big a one as he had hoped. She may not be left with a tangible reminder of what happened to her, but the psychological damage was done; his sister would never be the same again.

She may get better one day, she may find a man she trusted, and she may even start a family, but the nightmares would forever remain. They'd stay long after everyone moved on, long after the smile returned to her face, long after everything returned to what could be considered normal for a person who had been through what she had, what they had. Still, the nightmares would invade her mind when she found herself alone, maybe when she took a shower and looked down at her body, or maybe when her friends were laughing and having a good time, and she would realise that she's not like them, that she's now a freak.

Brendan realised he was still standing in front of Cindy, silently staring at her, but not really looking. He took a shaky breath and looked at the hint of fear in her eyes, and he wondered what his sister looked like when she realised what was happening to her. He pushed himself away, and walked out of the store, grocery bags in hand.

Xxx

"Chez, I'm home!" Brendan knew she wouldn't come bounding down the stairs like she once used to, but he wanted to keep some form of normalcy. He walked through the living area, into the kitchen, and started putting items away. Brendan knew Cheryl was in her room, watching daytime television, and she wouldn't move from there unless she needed the loo, she wouldn't even shower; too afraid to look at her own body. She didn't do much of anything to be honest, just sat there, a shell of her former bright, bubbly self.

Brendan made his way to her bedroom upstairs, armed with a bag full of chocolates, tampons, and sanitary towels. The quicker he was rid of these items from his possession, the better. He gently creaked her bedroom door open and poked his head through to a sight he had unfortunately grown used to. Cheryl was in the pyjamas that she'd been wearing for a week, and she was curled up in her bed where she had created a nest for herself, watching what sounded like reruns of _Friends_. Brendan doubted that she was actually paying any attention to it; she seemed to be lost in her own world a lot recently, only appearing to be in touch with reality.

"Chez, I got you those YORK bars that you like, simply because they say it's not for girls." Brendan opened the door wider, stepped into the room and sat down at the foot of her bed. She didn't really like people being near her, especially of the male species. He could tell that she made a special effort for Brendan, to have him close, but he wanted things to be easy for her, so he kept his distance no matter how much he wanted to hold her and cocoon her from the world. Brendan made a mental note to call Eileen or Lynsey, so they could come over and help her take a bath, or at least convince her to take one herself.

"So I got you… erm… those things you need. I wasn't sure what you used, so Cindy gave the best of each. I nearly ran out of there from the sheer embarrassment. She found it hilarious that I was out buying these –"

"I'm sorry," it was barely above a whisper, and Brendan wasn't sure if he was hearing things, but she spoke again, a little clearer this time, but still just above a whisper. "I'm sorry I put you through that."

The feeling of guilt twisted in Brendan's stomach, he shouldn't have been feeling embarrassed when he had her to think about. "Hey, no, don't be sorry. I was kidding. In fact, if there are specific ones you use, I'll go and get it for you." She looked at him then, with what could've passed as a look of gratitude, if she hadn't perfected the look of defeat. They both sat there in silence for a little bit longer, Brendan staring at the back of his hands, and Cheryl with her attention back on the telly.

"Where's dad?" Brendan asked begrudgingly, and Cheryl gave a soft shrug, but they both knew that he was probably in the pub getting drunk off his face. He hated to leave Cheryl at home alone with the man, considering what had happened to her, and what he knew Seamus was capable of. However, Cheryl was the apple of Seamus's eye, and if Brendan and his father had anything thing in common, then it was their love for Cheryl.

After Cheryl's mum passed away two years ago from pancreatic cancer, fifteen year old Cheryl was the only thing that had kept their family from falling apart. Brendan's own mother had died when he was eight, so death was nothing new to him, but that didn't mean that Maggie's death was easy for him, or any of them. Seamus fell into further alcoholism, and he refused to show any emotion to anyone, except at night. At night he would come into Brendan's room, and show his anger through his fists; they'd pummel into every bit of Brendan he could get a hold of, and Brendan would take it. He would take everything his father gave him, because it meant that his father was here, in his room, and not in Cheryl's.

When his sister asked about the bruises, he would just say he got drunk and got into fights, lots and lots of fights. She believed him easy enough; after all he was Brendan Brady, the boy about town with an aggressive streak and petulance for trouble. She'd cry and tell him how she just lost her mum, and what if he got killed in one of these fights, she wouldn't be able to take losing her brother too. To save Cheryl the heart ache, Seamus kept his bruises in places Brendan could cover them up, so eventually she stopped asking questions.

If it was just Brendan and Seamus, he would've left the old fucker as soon as Maggie died. Brendan tried running away once when he was about twelve, but Maggie was distraught with grief, thinking he'd left because of her, because he hated the woman his father left his mother for. But he didn't. He didn't hate Maggie, because Maggie loved him like her own, even when his own father couldn't. He stayed because he didn't want to take away the boy Maggie had come to call her own, he stayed because of the little girl who looked at him like a hero with bright green eyes, and it's the little girl he stayed for after Maggie died.

However, Brendan got into university back in Ireland, and he was supposed to be there now, going to loads of shitty student parties, getting drunk off his face, and ending up god knows where. He was supposed to be fucking randoms in public toilets, and turning up to lectures on business management with a massive hangover. Cheryl had insisted that he go, and how she'd see him loads on holidays, and he'd be tired of the sight of her. Things didn't go to plan, and instead two weeks ago a bastard didn't know how to stop when Cheryl said no, and so he stayed. And he'd stay here until the fragile remains of his sister's shattered self were back together, and that bastard paid in blood.

Brendan stood up and opened Cheryl's cupboard, put the stuff he got for her inside, and turned. He didn't know what to do, so he found himself asking, without even realising, "What can I do to make it better?"

"It's his bail hearing today, you know. He'll be out." Brendan knew that, but he didn't know how she did. She never left her room and wouldn't talk to the police or her solicitor. She could tell what he was thinking, "I heard you on the phone to Warren. He'll be out. It's the first time he's done anything stupid. It's normally the younger brother that gets in trouble and he's the responsible one, the one that straightens him out."

It's the most she'd said in weeks, and he wished she was more optimistic, but he couldn't help but agree with her. He was definitely going to be granted bail, and essentially the case was based on his word against hers. Him, the do gooder who looked after the drunks he had for parents and the younger brother who wasn't ever far from trouble, against her, the bubbly girl who liked attention, wearing high heels, and short dresses.

"Even if he does get bail, that doesn't mean he'll get away with this. I won't let him." Brendan was adamant about that. He wouldn't let it happen; nobody hurt his baby sister and got away with it. He would've killed the fucker as soon as he found out what had happened to Cheryl, if he hadn't already been arrested by the time he got there with Warren and the rest of the boys. He had turned up at the house with an iron rod, and nothing but the desire to spill blood, but the police were already there, dragging him away, so he turned and went back to his sister. For the past two weeks, he had been suppressing the urge to visit him prison and rip his head off. But without a doubt he'd be out today and Brendan would see him pay.

Cheryl stared at him like she didn't believe a word that was coming out of his mouth, because right now, she felt like the world was against her. Brendan would have to change that. He moved closer to her, crouched beside her and looked her dead in the eye. "I will kill him, Chez. He will suffer."

Cheryl gave him a small smile. She didn't believe him, but she appreciated the sentiment. In her eyes Brendan would forever remain the best of people. But if it really came down to it, he would take the life of another to protect his own. Brendan leaned in slowly so as not to startle her, and kissed her on her forehead before getting up to leave the room.

As Brendan made his way down the stairs, the front door swung open and Seamus stumbled in. "Hey, if it isn't Brenda." Seamus slurred, collapsing onto the sofa.

Brendan rolled his eyes and walked past him, into the kitchen to drink a glass of water before he was to head out. He was a man on a mission. He braced himself and breathed in a couple of times before he head for the front door, but Seamus's voice stopped him short.

"Where are you going, Brenda?" Brendan's left cheek twitched as he composed himself and turned to look at his father. "Make me a cup of tea."

"Do it yourself; you can see I'm on my way out."

Seamus was just about the right amount of drunk to ignore the rude tone in Brendan's voice. If he were a little more sober, or a little drunker, Brendan would've got a smack. Instead he pursued to fill Brendan with even more anger, "Going to see that wee girl of yours, Eileen was it? Does she know what you are, hmm? Does she know you're a little queer?"

Eileen was Brendan's on off girlfriend for the past year, ever since she moved to Chester from Belfast. They had cooled things when his plan was to move back to Ireland. He didn't know what they were now that he'd stayed, but he wasn't sure he wanted to be in a relationship anymore. She was no doubt beautiful, but Brendan had never really been that into her, he hadn't really been into any of the girls he had been with. Relationships to him were a waste of time and energy, what was the point of sharing your life with someone when you couldn't share your secrets with them too.

Eileen came over a few times to see Cheryl, and she helped her change her clothes, and stroked her hair while she tried to cry away the memories. Brendan guessed he was still dating her then, she acted like a girlfriend should, and there was no reason to take away from Cheryl one of the only two people that weren't family, that she'd let near her. He may not love Eileen the way he should, but he knew what was good for his sister.

Brendan ignored his father and slammed the door behind him, as he left the flat. He might not be able to beat his father in a fight, but he was no queer because of it.

He pulled out his phone while he climbed down the stairs from his place, and dialled Warren's number.

"Brady." Warren answered the phone with his usual greeting of referring to Brendan by his surname. A name that felt too often like a noose around his neck. Being a Brady meant he had to live up to a certain reputation, one wrong move, and he'd drag the name through the mud and would have to face Seamus's wrath.

"Foxy, you got your car?"

"Yeah, but what do you want with it?" He had a note of suspicion to his question. He knew the date, and he knew that Brendan's temper would come to a head at some point.

"I need you to bring the car over, and get the boys with you? Get Danny, Fred all of them?"

"Brady, are you planning on doing what I think you're planning on doing?" The suspicion in his voice had been replaced with excitement. This was all fun for Warren, but for Brendan it was his sister's life. If that bastard got away scot free, then Cheryl would never leave her room, and he was scared, scared that she'd turn into him. He couldn't have that, he couldn't let his baby sister turn into this pit of darkness that he was, and she wouldn't be able to handle this empty life that he led, and he was scared she'd end it.

"Yeah, Foxy. Yeah I am." Brendan hung up the phone after establishing a meeting point, and put his phone in the pocket of his leather jacket. He had to do this, he had to kill him. Today he was going to crash a party. It seemed only fitting that he took the fucker's life during a party, when the bloke essentially stole his sister's during one. Today he was going to kill Joseph Hay.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

Warren insisted on parking the car as far away from the estate as possible, though it was frustrating to have to walk the length they could've driven, Brendan understood. The estate wasn't exactly a place where he could park his fancy BMW without the risk of it either being stolen, or having serious damage done to it, so they walked the rest of the way.

Danny was in Liverpool, so he couldn't make it, and Fred thought it was a bad idea. He told Brendan it was only bail release, and Joseph Hay had the actual court case to go yet, he could very well be convicted. Apparently beating up the perv would send a bad message on behalf of Cheryl, would make it seem like she had a family of thugs, and something to hide. Still Brendan couldn't risk it; the prick was out today and within Brendan's reach. His desire to spill blood was so very close to being fulfilled.

The arsehole was having a party too. Brendan heard it in price slice when some of Joseph's friends went in to buy beer and cider, and all the cheap alcohol they could carry. Brendan couldn't believe what he was hearing; his sister was at home, stewing in her own filth and imprisoned by the damage that Joseph did to her, like she was the one that did something wrong, while he was having a party, celebrating his release. Brendan hadn't approach them, he kept his back to them and pretended he was engrossed by the TV Choice magazine; there was no point starting a fight, when the person he really wanted to hurt wasn't there.

The rest of the boys came though, so all together there were five of them, but really he and Warren were the only ones capable of any real damage. They walked past gangs of boys in trackies and hoodies, kids far too young to be smoking, and girls that he wanted to drag home because there was a rapist on the loose. But he didn't, because none of these people really believed that. They all thought Cheryl was a desperate teen who always craved the attention of Joseph Hay, the older boy with green eyes and blonde hair, that had her salivating after him. Why would she say no to a guy she wanted for so long? They all thought she was a slut who had sex with Joseph Hay, then cried rape. He was the victim here.

The air was too warm for mid-September, or maybe it was the heat of blood rushing through his veins, but either way Brendan was beginning to get agitated. Before he was fully aware, they were about ten feet away from the house where he stopped short to look at the place. It was a pretty run down semi detached house, like most of the houses in the area. It had a gate that was loose on its hinges and was swinging softly in the breeze, and the hedges outside looked like they had never been tended to. It looked like a place that you wouldn't even let your dog step foot in; perfect for the filth that lived within it.

Brendan and the boys were about to start walking again but his phone started to ring. Frustrated by the delay, he struggled to dig the thing out of his pocket. It was Eileen. He thought about ignoring it, but what if it was about Cheryl, he couldn't remember if he had just planned to call her to check up on Cheryl, or if he actually did. He looked at the screen for a couple more seconds before finally picking up.

"Eileen, this isn't really a good time."

"Hello to you too." She wasn't really annoyed, she had become accustomed to his discourteous manner on the phone, he was never one for frivolous chat. "I was just calling to see if you want me to come over and-"

"Yeah, Cheryl will really appreciate that. I'm not home at the moment, but you know where the spare key is."

"Yes. Cheryl. Of course." Her tone suggested that it wasn't Cheryl she wanted to come over for. She wanted to see her boyfriend and help his sister out while she's there, but helping the sister wasn't the primary motive of her visit.

"Look, I'm in the middle of something now, but I'll see you soon, yeah? And if you do go over to the flat, could you try get Chez to have a bath? I gotta go now." Brendan hung up the phone before Eileen could reply to any of that.

He looked up to see all four of the boys looking at him with a curious expression, but it was Warren that spoke up as usual. The other boys wouldn't dare ask Brendan about personal life, but Warren would gladly prod the temperamental lion. "Thought you two were over, but now she's going over to your house when you're not there to take care of your sister? That doesn't sound like an ex-girlfriend, mate; that sounds like a wife."

Brendan looked at Warren, hoping to intimidate him by staring at him for long enough, but that party trick never seemed to work on him. The other three looked at the ground and were playing with their hands, or kicking the ground with their feet, because they did fear Brendan, but Warren went on, "Does she go grocery shopping, and buy tampons that she leaves lying around too?" Why the hell did Brendan not think of that; get Eileen or Lynsey to buy that shit for Cheryl. However, it was mid-September and they should've all been in college or whatever, and Cheryl was so embarrassed by the mess she made, he knew she'd get even more upset if he told other people.

"Look, I don't know, yeah. She's a decent fuck, and she's willing to put up with my crap. So when you find a girl who can barely look at you, then you can come back and throw jokes at me. In the meantime, can we just do what we came here to do?"

"Alright, I was only messing."

"Well, I'm not in the mood." Brendan sighed and turned his attention back to the house. It didn't look like there was a party going on in there; he couldn't even notice any movements. Maybe Joseph didn't get bail, and there was no reason for them to have a party.

Brendan told Warren and the boys to stay put while he got closer to the house to investigate, which earned him eye rolls from the group. If he was seen by anyone, he wouldn't be recognised as Cheryl's brother, no one here knew him. The only thing that would make him stand out, was the fact the he was dressed completely differently to the people around here. He wore dark Levis, they wore tracksuit bottoms. He wore a black long sleeved top, and they wore polo t shirts. He wore a leather jacket, and they wore hoodies. Chalk and cheese.

Despite this, Brendan made his way through the gate and found himself at the front door. He could hear Warren loudly whispering behind him, calling him back and asking him what the hell was he playing at. Brendan ignored him, and instead made a fist and banged it against the door, instantaneously regretting it when his hand became covered in some sticky substance. This was no time for hygiene though, and no one was answering the door, so he banged against it again, and he continued doing so until he heard a voice from inside.

"Alright, for fuck's sake. I'm coming!"

This was it. He was going to come face to face with his sister's assaulter. Brendan was prepared to maim, to kill, but he wasn't cold blooded about it.

The door swung open, but it wasn't Joseph Hay on the other side. It was a golden skinned boy with brown hair and lashes that only existed on cartoon characters. There was something about him that was unconventionally mesmerising; he had unrealistically blue eyes, and pouty lips that looked like they were petal soft. The kid raised one eyebrow and Brendan blinked a few times; why the fuck was he thinking about how soft his lips were?

He tried to speak but he wasn't expecting anyone other than Joseph to open the door, so he stood there; dumbstruck. The kid spoke first.

"Look, can I help you with something, or are you just gonna stand there like your brain just dropped out of your ears?" He had a heavy Manchester accent which functioned to further entrance Brendan.

Brendan swallowed, "erm, are you Joseph's brother?"

"No, I'm his pet rabbit. Who are you?" He sighed, seemingly already bored of this conversation. Brendan couldn't help but be a little amused by the boy's attitude, and he found himself failing to suppress a smirk.

"Is your brother in?" Brendan tried to sound neutral, but there was something that made the boy frown and his eyes travelled over Brendan's shoulder. Brendan turned his head to look behind him, and luckily Warren and the boys had hidden out of view.

Brendan looked back to see the boy staring back at him with narrowed eyes, not saying anything. Eventually, he sighed again and said, "no."

Well, what was Brendan supposed to do now? He didn't think the kid was lying, the house looked dead inside, and Brendan guessed that he was the only one home. Silence descended between the two, and Brendan could hear a cat screeching somewhere behind him followed by vicious barks, but eventually they stopped too, resuming the silence. Shit was getting awkward here.

"Well, where is he then?"

The boy tilted his head to a side and asked, "You a friend of his? I've never seen you before."

"I'm a new friend. Are you gonna tell me where he is or not?"

The blue eyes of the boy travelled from Brendan's head to toe lazily before looking him in the eye. "If you're a friend of his, then you know exactly where he is."

Brendan's heart was beginning to pound, and he feared that the boy would be able to hear, revealing that he in fact was an intruder looking to smash up Joseph Hay's skull. He wanted to wrap his hands around the perv's neck, and squeeze as hard as he could to feel the pulse in his throat erratically quicken with adrenaline, before slowing down to a stop. Brendan wanted to look into his eyes and watch it cloud over with darkness as his body slackened and gave in to death. He once read somewhere that every act of brutality has some form of grace, eloquence. That looking into the eyes of a dying person, was like looking at the death of a star. It shines and explodes with life, just before leaving a pit of sucking blackness. Brendan didn't know anything about that; he just hoped that afterwards he could breathe again. That Cheryl could live again.

Brendan's palms were beginning to get sweaty; he didn't come here for a fucking conversation. He came for retribution, and this was beginning to seem like a waste of time. "I know it's the bail hearing today, and I was just wondering if he's back yet."

"He's not."

Brendan leaned his weight onto one foot. This lad didn't trust him, but he was the only way at the current moment to find out when he can get his hands on the fucktard. If he's not back yet, then maybe he wasn't granted bail, maybe the police were doing their fucking job for once. However, Brendan hadn't received a call from Cheryl's solicitor telling him, hence he gathered that there was just some form of delay.

"When's he back?" Brendan asked, trying to sound like a concerned friend. The only person he was concerned about was probably at home, watching the nth episode of Friends.

The kid sighed and answered what seemed truthfully, "We don't actually know. Terry's there now."

Who the fuck was Terry?

Brendan didn't know where to go from there, so he stood, and for some reason he didn't turn to leave straight away. Instead he looked at the boy with closer inspection. He eyed the boy's high cheekbones, and the way the kid's hair fell over his forehead making it unclear where his hair stopped and his obscenely long lashes started. And that's when he noticed it. The hint of bruising around the boy's left eye. It was healing and had turned a yellowish colour, making it almost camouflage with his golden skin, but Brendan has had too many bruises like that on his own face to not notice it. On Brendan it made him look like a thug that had gotten into a pub brawl, or something to that effect, but it made him look implausibly vulnerable. This was the brother that was supposed to be the trouble maker? He guessed the bruise proved that he probably was, but no one knew more than Brendan that every bruise wasn't deserved. This kid looked like someone had tried to tackle Bambi, and Brendan found himself wanting to ask about it, but he asked instead,

"So... what's your name?"

The boy stepped out of the house, making Brendan take a couple of steps back, he hadn't even realised how close he was standing. The younger boy was a few inches shorter than Brendan, but it was he who found himself feeling curiously nervous.

"I put a broadcast on his Facebook page about what's going on. I'm surprised you haven't seen it… Joey's friend." He added the last bit as if to tell Brendan he knew that he was up to something.

"I'm not on Facebook much. Don't have time for it."

"How do you know Joey?"

Brendan swallowed, "College."

The boy laughed disbelievingly. Shit, Brendan worried if he was busted. "Joey is twenty one years old. You say he's a new friend, but he hasn't been to college in two years."

Fuck, fuck, fuck. "I mean I know him through people I went to college with. Take college out of the equation, I would never know your brother. Vis a vis college is the reason I know him."

Brendan could tell the boy hadn't taken much of that in, but he didn't look too concerned about it either. Instead he said, "you don't look the Hollyoaks sixth form type. More private school type." He nodded towards Brendan's crucifix, "Catholic private school type."

Brendan didn't actually go to Hollyoaks sixth form, or the secondary school that came with it. The boy was right, he did go to a catholic private school, the type that said accept all but ingrained social prejudice amongst its students. Cheryl did though, Cheryl went to Hollyoaks High, and now she was supposed to be starting the sixth form. The school said they'd take her on whenever she felt she was ready, but he didn't know if Cheryl had it in her to go to a place where everyone would look at her like she was a liar. The girl who cried wolf… or rape in this case. Brendan knew Cheryl spoke often about the guys she was interested in, and the guys she thought were interested in her. Recently she had started talking about the green eyed older boy who had taken a liking to her. She blushed when she spoke about him back then, not like now, now she didn't speak much of anything.

"Don't judge a book by its cover, kid." Even if in this case his judgement was correct. Brendan hated how the boy could read him. He knew Brendan wasn't someone to be trusted, and he knew Brendan wasn't telling the full story about how he knew his brother. Brendan just hoped he wouldn't link him back to Cheryl.

"Well, I just started college, and _I_ haven't seen you around."

"Do you even turn up to college?" Brendan questioned, making the boy grin, he was obviously proud of his reputation as a truant. "Besides, I've finished now. I have a job." A concept no one in this area was probably aware of.

The blue eyed boy considered him for a moment before taking out his phone. Brendan began to panic a little bit and turned around to look at the spot where he had left Warren and the others, but they were still hidden. At least he hoped they were hidden and they hadn't decided to leave him; if the boy was calling for backup he would need his own.

Turns out he was only looking at the time. "Look, the party doesn't start till later. Like at least eight o'clock, so it's best if you come back then to see him. I'm sure he'll appreciate the support."

Brendan had a sudden urge to shout, _what the fuck?_ Support. What for? Leaving his victim alive when he would've preferred her not to live to tell the tale? These people really did believe that Joseph was the innocent party here. Brendan was about to tell the kid exactly what he thought of his brother, when a woman's voice came from behind.

"Who the hell is this?"

A slightly oversized blond woman in a pink track suit came to stand beside him with an arm full of shopping bags filled with what looked like crisps, and sweets, and all sorts. She was welcoming home her rapist son, not celebrating his fifth birthday. Jesus.

"Mum, this is Joey's friend. He didn't realize the party was tonight, and he came to see him now."

The woman looked him up and down, much like her son did, except she had an edge of aggression to her gaze. "Joey's not here yet."

"I already told him that." Brendan might not as well be here, because the kid kept answering for him.

The woman looked at her son with a stare that said, '_be careful who you're talking to,'_ then looked back at Brendan to tell him to get lost until the party, because they were far too busy now. She looked like she wouldn't know a hard days of work if it slapped her across her already red face. After giving Brendan another once over, she barged passed her son and into the house.

Even if it was a good thing that these people didn't recognise him, a part of Brendan hated them even more for it. Collectively, they had torn his family apart, and they didn't even know who he was. They didn't know about the damage they had caused. Or maybe they did and they just didn't care. Brendan looked around the estate again. There was an old couple a couple of doors away, sitting outside on lawn chairs and smoking cigarettes with a pit bull terrier by the woman's side. Yeah, these people didn't care what happened to his sister.

"She thinks you're with the press. We've been getting a lot of them." The boy spoke up, so as to explain his mother's dismissive attitude, and possibly his own suspicions. "You also don't look like someone who'd be friends with Joey."

Brendan feigned laughter, like the idea that he was anything other than Joseph's friend was absurd. He put his hands in his pocket and squeezed the wrench he made Warren get for him from the garage he worked at tight, as if he could transfuse some of his tension into the metal. Brendan was angry again. He was angry, because for a moment he forgot that he was talking to the brother of the guy he was going to kill, and for a moment he forgot all about being angry. Brendan wanted to smash this kid's head in now as well, because he wasn't allowed to do that. He wasn't allowed to make Brendan look at any of them as if they were humans, because it took a real sick bastard to stand by a rapist.

Brendan stepped towards the boy, still clutching onto the weapon in his pocket, but his mother's voice from inside made the kid turn away from him. "Ste, get your fucking arse in here right now."

The boy, this Ste gave Brendan an apologetic smile as if to say he was actually enjoying talking to Brendan, and Brendan wanted to grab the nearest rock and crack the boy's skull with it, because he somehow liked it too. He liked talking to the boy.

"So... I guess I'll see you at the party, then?" It was Ste who spoke, and he knew that Brendan wasn't invited originally, but he was inviting him now.

Brendan gave a stiff nod, offering a tight smile, and turned away from the boy to walk out of the property, but as he reached the gate he turned back to him, "Ste's an odd name."

The boy smiled again and entered his house, ready to close the door, but first he said, "It's short for Steven."

And before Brendan could help it, he heard himself reply, "I like Steven." The kid grinned again, closing the door, and Brendan realised he was smiling too. Genuinely smiling.

He hated Steven.

Brendan found Warren and the rest next to some motorbike that he hadn't noticed on the way here. Warren was admiring the aesthetics when Brendan approached, and he when noticed Brendan was back he rounded on him.

"What the hell are you playing at? We came here to crack some skulls, not make friends with kids barely out of their nappies!"

"He's hardly a baby, he's probably about seventeen." Brendan said, not entirely sure why. The look on Warren's face told him that he didn't see the point in that little bit of information either. "Look, he's the kid brother, and I was just getting information from him."

"And what did you learn?"

That his name was Steven, he went to Hollyoaks sixth form college but rarely turned up, the bruises on his face meant he either got into a lot of fights like Brendan, or he had secrets like Brendan. He had the bluest eyes Brendan had ever seen; a different blue to his own. Brendan's eyes had the colour of the sky at twilight, an almost royal blue tone, but the boy's eyes were ocean blue, and if Brendan wasn't careful, he'd find himself drowning in them.

"He's not there yet, but the party starts about eight, so he should be back around that time. We'll come back then. It's a small house, so it won't be too hard to find him in the crowd." Brendan's voice was mechanical, he had to remind himself that he was here for a purpose, and that purpose was not Steven Hay.

Warren regarded him for a little while longer, but accepted that Brendan stayed at the Hay front door for longer than necessary because of necessity rather than choice. Instead he told Brendan about the bike that he was leaning against. It belonged to Joseph Hay, and Brendan wondered how a guy who lived in the house he did, could afford a bike like this. He wasn't left thinking about it for too long as one of the boys, Kyle, told him that apparently he had won it in a poker match. Warren wanted to steal the heap of metal, ride it to the middle of nowhere, and set it alight.

"I don't have time for that now, I have to convince Katy to give me my job back in a bit, and it's gonna take me longer than usual to get there from here as it is." No, Brendan couldn't steal the bike now, but he felt a pang of satisfaction as he got his keys out of his pocket and used one to create a deep carving along its body. If he closed his eyes he could imagine it to be Joseph's flesh, he could almost feel the gratification of skin ripping. And if he really tried, he could pretend that loud scraping noises were Joseph's screams for mercy. The way his sister screamed. This was good, he was back on task. The only thing missing here was the blood.

Brendan would return for that later.

Xxx

Brendan tumbled in fifteen minutes later than the time he said he would meet Katy, and she was not happy. "You call me to tell me you want to see me then, turn up late yourself. Really, Brendan?"

"I'm sorry, something came up." Brendan was panting a little. Warren dropped him off only half way because the lard had to return to his own job, so Brendan had to run the rest of the way. He would have to get his own car soon, maybe he should've stolen the bike after all.

Katy no longer looked at Brendan with anger or frustration, and instead a look of pity covered her face. He preferred the anger. "Is it Cheryl? Is she okay?"

Brendan shrugged off his jacket, "She's… she's how you last saw her, but I'm working on it."

Katy placed an arm on his shoulder, and squeezed in a way that was supposed to be reassuring, but she had unknowingly put pressure on a bruise that was still considerably fresh. Brendan didn't show any signs of pain, physical pain was something he had become long adapted to, he just wished the other type of pain would cease too.

"Brendan, sweetheart, please don't do anything stupid. Let the police deal with this." Brendan shrugged her hands off him, because people saying shit like that to him pissed him off to no end. The police weren't going to do shit; they let a rapist back on the loose even if it was just for bail.

"Katy, I'm just here to ask for my job back. I'm obviously not going to Uni this year, and I could really use the distraction from home." He wouldn't beg for this job. He asked, and if she refused, he'd go somewhere else, but he would not beg. He learnt a long time ago begging got you nowhere.

"Honey, of course. I assumed you already realised that you'd always have a job here. If your cocktails weren't a selling point, your arse sure as hell is." Katy grinned at him, hoping to lighten the mood. She told him to go on straight out to the bar, and it'd be just him and Anne out there today because she was in the kitchen all day.

Brendan grabbed a dishcloth from the side on his way out to the bar, where he had the perfect view of Anne's arse. She was bending over the bar, pawing over some bloke who she'd probably tease until she saw someone better looking, and then she'd move on. Brendan was about to use the dishcloth to whack Anne on the arse like he did every time in greeting, but he couldn't get himself to do it this time with what happened to Cheryl heavy on his mind. Instead he gently placed his hand on her back to get her to stand up straight, and walked to the other end of the bar, where a man was waiting for a drink; he'd obviously been waiting a while if the look on his face was anything to go by.

The people waiting for their drink may not have gotten Anne's attention, but she was quick to abandon her conquest when she noticed Brendan.

"Brendan, babe, how are you?"

He didn't turn to look at her, all his attention was on pouring the perfect pint, "I'm fine, Anne. Why wouldn't I be?"

She still wasn't serving drinks. Apparently her sole job was to look pretty and lure in the punters, the rest of the work it seemed, was Brendan's job.

"You just got more frown lines than normal, that's all. Eileen still jealous about us, is she ?" This is why he loved Anne. She may call herself Mitzeee with three e's, she may be considered the local tart with a shallow heart, but he was friends with Anne. Anne knew him, knew when he wanted to pretend everything was normal, and right now he wanted to pretend his biggest problem was Eileen's jealousy over her.

"She'll always be jealous over us, Anne. She may be in my bed, but you're in my heart." That cheesy line warranted him a smack on the arse from her. She grinned and finally turned her attention to a customer and poured them a vodka tonic, but she wasn't done talking to Brendan yet.

"I haven't seen her in ages. Last time I spoke to her, she looked as if she was ready to rip my hair off. Do you know how much conditioner I have to use to get this looking as good as it does?"

"No, but I'm sure you gonna tell me."

"I get through a bottle in a week!"

"Jesus, Mary and Joseph." Brendan wasn't really listening, but he guessed she said something that was supposed to shock him. They carried on like that for the rest of the night; her jabbering on, and him only pretending to pay attention. She was just background noise to be honest, background noise that he was very fond of.

Around seven thirty, when Brendan made his excuses to leave and had his jacket on, did Anne say something that had probably been on her mind since she saw him. "Brendan, I know you, and I'm begging you, stay away from the Hay boy."

He should've told her what he already knew, that begging never works. "Which Hay boy? There's two."

She walked up close to him and hugged him out of the blue. "I know it's hard for you to leave this be, but you'll find yourself in more trouble than you realise if you get involved in bringing him down yourself." She was still holding on to him tight, and a part of him realised that she was scared of letting him go, because if anyone knew about a party going on it was Anne, or the Mitzeee version of her, anyway. She knew he was going to go up there, and she was scared about what he was capable of.

Brendan wrapped his arm around her gently, and kissed the top of her head before slowly pulling her away. He was glad that she stayed with her Aunt Katy above the pub, and not somewhere she had to get to alone at night. She was too beautiful for her own good, and she seemed to attract the sleaziest of men. Brendan made a mental note to talk to her about some self-defense classes. Cheryl didn't like Anne much because Anne seemed to attract the boys Cheryl liked, but maybe now they could go to these classes together. Find some common ground.

Brendan avoided Anne's enquiries and said his goodbyes. He left through the back and picked up the wrench he'd left outside on his way in, and gripped it hard in his hand. He let the cold of the metal seep through his skin, because right now his blood was close to boiling over.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

Ste grabbed an old chair from the kitchen and dragged it out the front door, so he could sit outside, and maybe, just maybe for a second he could pretend he was somewhere else. Somewhere that didn't have his mother screaming at him when he accidentally dropped all the sausage rolls, or somewhere he could actually open a window without having to use a fucking crowbar. He wanted to be somewhere he belonged, somewhere that felt like home. Joey made the house a home.

He looked at the old swinging gate that he couldn't remember ever actually being closed. They moved to this pit from Manchester when he was about 14, and three years on he couldn't recall that gate ever being closed. Ste didn't really know why it was bothering him now, but for some reason the fact annoyed him. Irritated him. Could nothing in his fucking life just function the way it was supposed to? Couldn't the fucking gate stay closed? Couldn't he perform the simple task of reading anything anyone above six could read? Couldn't his mum ever just stop snapping and side with him for once when Terry came after him? Couldn't he have a normal family where his parents weren't abusive, neglectful drunks, and his brother wasn't accused of being a rapist?

His brother was accused of being a rapist.

It was bullshit. Of course it was.

Ste grew up with Joey. Joey was the reason he wasn't bullied in school for being a complete, utter retard. He was the reason people respected him. Ste Hay was Joey Hay's younger brother. That meant something in these ends, because Joey was a good guy. He had loads of friends and teachers that loved him, and he was super smart which meant he was going places. Joseph Hay did not, would not, rape a girl. If Ste knew anything about his brother, it was that.

However, Ste may know that, but what if the courts didn't believe it? He remembered when the forensic team took a bunch of Joey's stuff away in plastic bags, including his bed sheets. He knew that they would find nothing on them, but that didn't stop his stomach turning due to the knowledege of what the police were looking to find with them. No one was allowed in the room after the police had been, just in case anyone tried to mess with the evidence, tried to hide Joey's non-existent guilt. The whole thing was all just fucking stupid, Joey was innocent and the police, forensic team, courts, everyone were wasting their time.

Joey was Ste's best friend, and he was the one that protected him. Joey maybe Terry's son, but it was Ste he protected when Terry got too drunk and started lashing out. It was Ste he took the multiple blows for one time when he wouldn't move out of the way so Terry could get to him. He loved Pauline too, more to the point Pauline loved him, and she didn't love anyone other than the person who could pay for her next drink. With Joey she played mum, she gave him the baths when he was younger, packed his lunches, kissed his wounds, and cried when Terry would try to attack him. With her own son however, with Ste, she didn't have enough love to share, she didn't have the time to tell anyone, much less her husband, to back the fuck away from her son.

Ste should've left. Amy, his former girlfriend and best friend told him he could stay with her. Her mum had left and her dad was nice enough to take him in until he could afford his own place, and he tried it, he did. For a short while. He tried it until Terry came barging in, demanding his son back, and when Amy's dad refused to let Ste return to the house, Terry tried to deck him. Amy's dad got there first, and Terry went flying through a glass door, making him need stitches on the back of his head. The only thing that stopped Terry going to the police was if Ste returned home to play the punch bag. So he did.

It wasn't so bad at first when he returned, Joey made Ste go out loads and loads with him and his friends, so he wouldn't be in Terry's way. At home he would keep an eye on Terry, make sure he directed his alcohol induced aggression in a way that wasn't towards Ste. Still, eventually Terry would punch his son and shove him out of the way to demand answers from Ste. Answers Ste couldn't give. He didn't know why the horse he made Ste put money on for him didn't win, he didn't know where all the beer had gone, and he didn't know why he was so fucking thick. So Terry would try to beat the answers out of him, until Joey would climb onto his back and drag him off while his mum would scream, "Joey, be careful!"

That was why Ste couldn't understand why anyone would accuse Joey of attacking them, when all he ever did for Ste was stop other people hurting him.

Ste returned back to reality when the gate that never closed swung open and Terry walked in. Alone. Ste's heart went a mile a minute; where the fuck was Joey?

Pauline must've heard the gate too, how, Ste didn't know. She was making so much noise in the kitchen, acting like she knew what she was doing in there when in actuality, she was only familiar with the fridge. She came bounding out in her pink tracksuit, oven gloves still on, with a big beam on her face which instantly fell when she realised there was no Joey.

"Where the fuck is he?"

Ste held his breath for the answer, a part of him wanted to cover his ears, so he didn't have to hear that new evidence had come to light and they're not releasing him after all, because they couldn't possibly let a monster like him roam the streets. Yet the other part of him just wanted to rip the band aid off and get it over with, so he sat there. Listening with his heart in his throat.

"I went to the toilet after they gave him bail, and when I came back out, he was already gone. Probably getting pissed with his new found freedom." Terry grumbled as if he wasn't much bothered about his son's whereabouts, and he'd really rather be drinking a can of cider in front of the telly. He was about to push past inside to probably do exactly that, when he stopped by Ste's chair and looked down at him. "What the fuck are you doing sitting out here like some faggot counting stars?"

Ste didn't answer, and both Pauline and Terry went back inside, but not before he heard Terry mumble, "They should've locked that waste of space up instead. Boy can't even read." Pauline hummed in agreement.

They blamed him when Joey first got arrested. They even told the police that if anyone in the house was in trouble, then it was Ste. Joey was just covering for him like he did last time. Last time when Ste ended up in youth offenders, just before they moved here, for taking one of his teacher's car for a joy ride, and then crashing it into a row of dumpsters, before abandoning it. Joey said it was him, but CCTV said something else, so he was carted off for 6 months, and that was perhaps the happiest moment of Terry's life. Neither Terry nor Pauline came to visit, but Joey did, he told him to keep his head down, to be safe, and keep himself to himself. There was no party when he came out, If Ste remembered correctly, Pauline and Terry were in the pub when Joey took him home. Ste didn't mind though, they ordered pizza, watched a load of junk TV, and Joey caught him up with the latest; they were moving to Chester because Terry thought he could find some work there.

He didn't.

The fact that Ste had been to youth offenders had followed him to Chester, and everyone in Hollyoaks high school seemed to know about it, earning him the title of a trouble maker. Soon enough, he completed the self -fulfilling prophecy, and he started skipping classes, turning the fire alarm on, vandalising the boys bathrooms, all the really stupid trivial immature things, because apparently that's what he was; a really stupid, little boy.

Ste could've sat there all night, stewing in self-pity, but right now he really wanted to know where his brother was. Thinking about how his life had turned out, was not going to find him. He was about to go back into the house to retrieve his jacket, when a figure by the entrance to the estate made him jump. For a brief second, Ste found himself thinking it might be the dark haired boy from earlier who claimed to be Joey's friend. Ste told himself he wanted to see the older boy again because the boy knew his name, but he didn't know the his. That was all.

It wasn't the dark haired boy.

It was Joey.

Ste felt a wave of relief flood through him, as Joey stepped into the light cast from a street lamp and gave Ste a limp smile. He was still wearing the suit he'd perhaps put on for court earlier today, but now his tie was loose around his neck, and the top buttons of the shirt that was no longer tucked into his pants were open. He looked a mess, and he walked towards Ste as if he didn't have the bones in his legs to keep him upright. When he came to an eventual stop in front of him, Ste realised he was gawping with his mouth open like a fish out of water.

"What's with the face, little brother? If the wind changes, it'll stay like that." Joey ruffled his hair and sat down on the chair that Ste had just vacated. The way he shifted in the seat made it seem like he was in pain and only now did Ste notice that his shirt was stained, and he stank of alcohol, not like when you drink it, but when someone pours it all over you.

Ste swallowed, "Are you okay, Joey?"

He ignored the question and started picking at his lips instead, he picked and picked until he drew blood, and Ste could do nothing but stare at the atypical behaviour of his brother. Joey was normally the one with all the answers, the one that you went to if you had a problem. To see him so….. helpless was jarring.

"Joey?!" Ste prompted, hoping to snap him out of whatever reverie he found himself in.

"I'm fine… Ste, I'm always fine." Joey sighed and turned his attention to his younger brother, forcing a beam onto his face. His mouth smiled, but his eyes didn't. The green of his iris that normally almost glowed bright, seemed to be shrouded by a darkness now, a feeling of no way out, because after all, who would believe him?

Joey had drunks for parents, a troublemaker for a brother who had been to youth offenders himself, and he lived in the part of town that bred criminals. Ste didn't know much about _her,_ but he did know she was a good catholic girl whose mum died, she's never had a boyfriend, and would never venture into these parts. She said so herself to Joey, Ste heard it.

Except she did. She did come here, and she - with her own free will - stepped into their home, and tore Joey's life apart.

Ste didn't want to hate her, but he couldn't help imagining her to be a little snake that had lured his brother into bed, then ran home and cried rape to her own brother. The infamous brother that Ste had never seen, but heard plenty about. Cheryl Brady was bubbly, her brother was not. Cheryl Brady made it her mission to talk to everyone, her brother made it his to stay away from everyone like they carried the plague. Legend has it, the brother only ever came out at night; while the world slept, he would wake and ponder the earth alone. They say he liked the sky to match his dark mind.

Apparently the only thing that wasn't dark and scary about him was his baby sister, they say if she ever killed someone, he'd take the blame and not think twice about serving a life sentence for her. That scared Ste. If her brother was so willing to sacrifice his freedom for his sister, would that mean he would come after Joey, and everyone Joey cared about? As selfish as it seemed under the circumstances, Ste was scared for his own safety. Cheryl's brother thought that Joey hurt his sister, so what if he tried to hurt Joey's brother? What if he tried to hurt Ste?

"Look, don't worry about me, eh. It's my job to worry about you." Joey spoke, forcing Ste to snap out of his thoughts with a sting of guilt. He _was_ worried about Joey, but he was worried about himself too.

"You look like shit, what's up with that?" Ste nudged him. If Joey wanted to act normal, then they'd act normal.

"I look like shit? Little brother, try looking in a mirror. I could be dragged across a river of nettles by my hair, and I'd still look better than you."

"You're kidding me, right? This," Ste used his index finger to circle his face to make sure Joey knew exactly what he was talking about, "is something God blesses only two people every hundred centuries with. Cheryl Cole is one, and my mug is the other. But it's okay, I still love you."

"Oh yeah," Joey grabbed the neck of Ste's T-shirt using it to drag him down and put him in a headlock. He used his knuckles to harshly rub the top of Ste's head. "Say I'm the better looking, brother. Say it, or I'll wear out all that hair, so you're left with a tonsure like a monk."

"Give… over. Get off me, Joey." Ste struggled to get out of his brother's clutches, but the older boy held on tight.

"Not until you say it." He continued to abuse the crown of Ste's head, and he knew that it would be sore after a few hours.

"Fine. Fine, you're the best looking one out of us." Joey released him, evidently satisfied with Ste's surrender, but Ste spoke again before his brain could kick in. "With looks like that, your bum must be sore from prison."

Silence descended between the two, and the genuine smile that had evolved on Joey's face sometime during their scuffle, had dropped. Ste felt like he could kick his own head in. He just joked that his brother who was falsely accused of rape was being raped himself in prison. What the fuck went through his thought process, when that splurged out of his mouth?

Ste tried to act like the moment didn't happen, "so, err, mum bought you a cake, but it was well rank, so I baked you one instead. It's vanilla, your favourite."

Joey turned his head away from Ste, and turned his attention back to whatever he was staring at in the distance before. "Why'd she buy me a cake in the first place?"

"You know, to celebrate you coming home. Your freedom. She's throwing you a whole party. Invited all your friends, and I told Amy to come over too. Hey, she might bring Rae, Rae's well fit." Ste was rambling; he did that when he was uncomfortable, when he felt guilty, happy, angry. He did that a lot. He didn't even think Rae was all that fit, she was pretty, but Ste wasn't gagging after her, it was just something to say to fill the silence. To fill the distance Ste felt between himself and Joey right now.

Finally Joey said something, "What if they didn't let me out?"

"Don't be daft. I wouldn't have gone to the trouble of making you a cake if I thought there was a chance of it going to waste."

Joey just hummed in response, and blinked slowly, as if even that act was strenuous. Ste put his hand on his brother's shoulder and squeezed comfortingly, "wanna go in? People will be arriving soon, also Mum and Terry are gonna burst an artery each soon, if you don't make an appearance."

Ste got a mirthless laugh in response, and a hand over his own, "do I _wanna_ go in? No. But… we don't want them dying on us just yet."

Joey got up and walked into the house lethargically and called out for their parents, and as Ste followed behind, he found himself thinking, '_don't we?'_

Xxx

Ste found Joey in his room, looking at a picture of when they were kids back in Manchester, and Joey was tickling a five year old Ste until he couldn't breathe. The photo was taken by Pauline in one of her rare moments, when she acted like a mum. That summer, Terry had left her with the kids for another woman, and even though she was distraught at first, they grew accustomed to his absence and found that they even enjoyed it. It didn't last too long, he returned by the time the leaves started falling off the trees and cried to Pauline about how he missed her and the boys, and how leaving her was the most stupid mistake he'd ever made. Pauline's co-dependency had him welcomed home in no time.

Joey must have heard Ste enter the room, because he put the photo down and muttered, "I made you this frame, remember? I made it in design and technology in school years ago, and I gave it to you for your birthday. You were so happy. You remember that?"

Ste went to sit on his bed and waited until Joey joined him before he answered, "Yeah, I remember. It was my tenth birthday, and I couldn't stop grinning all day. Made you dig out a photo we could put in it."

Joey smiled at the memory, whilst looking at the ground. He had his hands between his legs, head bowed, and his shoulders slumped; how anyone could think he was guilty of anything, let alone what he was being accused of, was beyond Ste.

Ste jumped up, suddenly overcome with the need to cheer his brother up and walked over to his closet, pulling out a box. "Look what I bought you? Mum and Terry thought you could sleep on the floor, but that's dead uncomfortable, so I got you this." Ste tossed over the box to his brother who caught it before it hit him across the face.

"An inflatable mattress. Wow."

"Yeah, you're sleeping in here cos the p… police aren't finished with your room. Until then, it's like old times. We can pretend it's like a sleepover."

"Sleepover?" Ste didn't like Joey's tone. "And what, I'll paint your fucking nails, and we'll play truth or dare? Pretend this blow up mattress is a bouncy castle, and have pillow fights? Ste, I'm not allowed to sleep in my own fucking room, because some skank got drunk off her face and can't remember what sluttish things she got up to, and then fucking-"

"Joey, I'm sorry!" Ste wanted him to stop; this wasn't meant to make him mad. It was made to make him excited that they'd be spending more time together, but he got it. Joey needed his space; he may have been released from prison, but there were constant reminders of what he was being accused of, and he couldn't even go to the one place where he could be alone. "I just wanted to make you feel better about everything."

Joey rubbed his face with both his hands, as if he could wipe away the frustration of this whole situation. "I know, little brother. I'm sorry, I shouldn't be taking it out on you."

Ste regained his position on the bed next to his brother and took the box off him, tearing into it to retrieve the deflated mattress inside. "Anyway, you'll be fine. They won't find anything there because there's nothing to find, right?" Joey nodded solemnly, and Ste took that as his cue to carry on, "besides I told the police that she was all over you. Practically sitting on your lap on the sofa."

Joey frowned and sat up straight to look at his younger brother, "You never told me you saw that?"

Ste abandoned his attempt to free the mattress, "well, I haven't had a chance to actually talk to you since the arrest. Shouldn't I have said owt? I just thought if they knew how much she was pawing over you, they'd know she was up for it."

Joey looked like he was having an inner battle, on one side he wanted to shout about how this made him look. Like she was teasing him, and he couldn't handle it when she rejected him. Her lawyer would spin this way out of context. However, on the other side, Joey could understand that Ste was doing what he thought was right. "No, it's fine," he eventually said, making a smile of relief appear on Ste's face, _thank god. _"Now can we please change the subject? I think I've had enough of talking about a sad little fuck I had with a girl who's obviously lost her fucking marbles. I should've known she was crazy with the amount of hairspray she must use to keep those curls in her hair."

Ste snorted a laugh which made Joey chuck a pillow at him to get him to shut up, but instead Ste chucked it back, and before either was aware, they were full on wrestling. "Thought you didn't want a pillow fight," Ste managed to squeeze out, as he tried to force the pillow from Joey's clutches.

"This. Isn't. A. Pillow. Fight. This is a battle that determines who is the strongest of the Hay boys."

Joey was suffocating Ste with the pillow when Terry came barging in. "Will you two knock that off? Some of us are trying to watch telly before all your fucking friends start showing up."

"Sorry, Terry." Ste gasped.

"Sure, Dad." Joey said, while still attempting to keep Ste's face covered with the pillow.

Terry grumbled something before slamming the door shut on his way out, and only then did Joey release Ste. "Don't wanna wake the incredible hulk."

They certainly wouldn't want to do that, Ste was bound to end up collateral damage.

Downstairs somewhere there was a loud knock, and Ste heard Terry yelling for Pauline to _get the fucking door. _Beside him, he heard Joey shift and stand up, and Ste watched him walk towards the drawer that he had cleared up for Joey's clothes. He must've already gone through them to know which one to go to exactly, and the knowledge made Ste feel uneasy. His brother had access to all parts of _his_ life, but he couldn't help feeling like Joey was drifting away from him.

Joey grabbed a few items of clothes and a towel from the basket by the bed, "gonna go have a shower. I stink of beer."

"Yeah, I've been meaning to ask, what happened?"

Joey shrugged, "went to the pub. There were a few people there that were all 'Go team Brady', and wanted a fight. Started shoving me about, told me I wasn't wanted and I should go kill myself for what I've done. Then a woman poured beer all over me before I was physically thrown out on my arse."

"Fuck, Joey, that's out of order."

Joey just simply shrugged again. They both knew it was unfair, and innocent until proven guilty and all that, but there were some people that didn't believe anything other than the worst when it came to the Hay boys. Joey threw him one last smile and headed out of the room.

Ste got up off the bed and straightened out his clothes. Someone had already come over for the party, and Ste was getting ready to go down and say hello.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

This time it was just Brendan and Warren. Too many unknown faces in the small house would raise suspicion, and Brendan needed to get in there and out without getting caught. Brendan had gone into Warren's workplace, and had waited for him to finish the car he was working on before the two were to head out. Warren didn't seem to realise the urgency of what they were doing. Brendan didn't have the time to get all hyped up about it, he didn't have the time to talk about all the grotesque things they should do to Joseph, and he didn't have the time to fucking wait for Warren to finish the fucking car he was working on. By the time they actually headed towards the house it was well past eight, and the time was closer to ten.

Eventually they got there, and both Warren and Brendan stood outside the house that previously looked like no one had accommodated it other than the blue eyed boy. Now the place had all its lights on, and there were people practically pouring out of it. There were men women and children upstairs, downstairs, inside, outside, everywhere. It looked like every council rat from every estate there was in Chester had managed to crawl off their sofa and make an appearance at the party. It could've been the free beer and finger food that lured them over, but Brendan knew that these types of people stuck together. If Brendan started demanding Joseph's whereabouts his agenda in regards to being in this area would be quickly discovered, and he'd be the one with a smashed up face.

Somewhere beside him, Brendan heard Warren say disbelievingly, "oh for fuck's sake. You think we'll stick out?"

Oh for fuck's sake indeed. Brendan quickly resurveyed the house, he looked at the two boys leaning outside a window on the upper floor smoking, then turned his gaze to the girls in the next room who had their backs to the windows and were engaging in conversation. There was a fuzzed up window next to that one, and Brendan assumed it was the bathroom, and even that had the outline of a person inside. The lower grounds had the curtains closed in the rooms, but all were alighted, and the front door to the house was wide open with people in the hallway and people leaning against the door frame. Outside the house sat a group of middle aged men drinking cans of cider, and the middle one was showing the others something on an ancient artefact that Brendan supposed was probably a mobile phone. Nobody paid attention to the two gawping lads who were standing outside the gates just staring at the house.

"Foxy, I don't think people will pay us enough attention to stick out," Brendan had finally concluded. It was true. There were too many people doing their own thing, there were probably loads of gate crashers in there. What would two more do?

Warren shrugged his shoulder like actually it didn't bother him either way and walked into the house like he was old friends with the family, and was used to going in uninvited. Brendan stood outside for a little longer; the plan was to make separate entrances and stay apart until one of them spotted Joseph. Then they would phone the other and take it from there.

Brendan slipped his hand into his pockets, and in the right one he gripped his phone whilst in the left he held on tight to the wrench. He was left handed, so that meant he could put more strength into it when it came time to using the tool as a weapon. Left hand meant more control, left hand meant it had a closer connection to his heart, the heart that was thumping so hard Brendan feared that somebody would be able to see the movement of it through his clothes and flesh.

With one last deep breath Brendan finally swung open the gate. He forced himself to walk at what he felt was a normal speed, too fast or too slow would draw attention. The sound of the earth beneath Brendan's feet growled in his ears with each step as if he was wearing steel boots made of spikes. He reached the front door without raising suspicion from the men much like Warren did, however unlike Warren, the girl leaning on the door frame turned her attention to Brendan when he reached her. He guessed that Warren barging in didn't leave her much time to scrutinise him, but his glacier pace in comparison drew her attention.

The others were still talking amongst each other when the girl dragged her eyes from Brendan's head to toe before settling on his eyes. She gave him a red lipstick coated smile and said, "Now, what's a guy like you doing in a place like this?"

Not the most original line, and Brendan had to suppress himself from raising an eyebrow at her. For all he knew she could genuinely be wondering why someone who sticks out like a sore thumb amongst these people was doing here. However with the girl's sultry smile, the way she turned her whole body to face him, and how she leaned the side of her head against the doorframe told Brendan that she was most probably flirting.

Flirting. Brendan could do that. Even if did make bile rise at the back of his throat.

He gave the girl his most charming smile, "well there was something about a party, but I've completely forgotten. Maybe you can assist me in remembering what the attraction to this place was."

"Oh this party doesn't have any attractions, even the alcohol is shit."

Brendan looked her dead in the eye, and summoned his most seductive voice when he said, "I can think of something that's _very _attractive."

And there it was. The bile climbing up his throat. He had to learn how to stop doing that before he ended up throwing up all over a girl's pretty little dress. This girl was wearing a very short one that was wrapped around wide hips, and significantly large breasts. She must've really believed in Joseph's innocence to come to this house dressed like that in 5 inch heels.

Satisfied with his attempts to woo her, she stood up straight, and put out an arm signalling for him to enter the house. This was it. He was stepping foot into the devil's boudoir led by a girl that looked like the personification of sin itself. It didn't help that most of Brendan's vision was mainly misty red and his blood ran hot; this may be where the devil lied, but hell itself was inside Brendan.

The inside of the house was just as bad as the outside. The wallpaper was peeling, the paint on the doors crumbling, and the carpet beneath his feet was worn out. Brendan wondered how anyone could live here; a prison cell looked more like a home than this place. Seemed fitting with where the Hay boys were heading. Maybe that's why the pair were a couple of delinquents, anywhere was a place better than this.

The girl led him through the crowds with liquid movements; her body just seemed to bend in places that seemed impossible managing to glide through the gathering of people swiftly. Brendan on the other hand, with his broad shoulders and big arms, seemed to bump into people left, right, and apparently smack in the crotch. How does someone know so many people? Brendan could hardly deal with more than two of Cheryl's friends at a time when she brought them over, and he never took his friends home. Not with his father observing his every movement, waiting for him to slip up, or say something about his life outside the house, so that he could use it against him. Use it to justify the beatings. Justify _everything._

Eventually she led him to a stop in the kitchen, passed him a warm beer, and he thanked her for it.

"I like your accent. Where's it from?" She leaned her hips against the kitchen counter, and folded her arms snug under her breasts while she regarded him.

Brendan chuckled low in his throat and raised an eyebrow; he thought his accent was pretty obvious.

Shit.

Was it too obvious? His sister's accent was different to his as a result of growing up for 8 years in a different part of Ireland from her, but would they put two and two together? What if they guessed that the boy with the Dublin accent is the brother of the girl with the Belfast accent? The girl who accused the innocent Joseph Hay of an odious crime, and now her crazy brother who had a few screws loose was here to make him pay.

Brendan didn't drop his smile. Instead he cleared his throat, and managed to force out through the mass panic now making its way around his insides, "Why don't you take a guess, ….?"

"Sarah."

"Why don't you take a guess, Sarah?"

Sarah bit her lips in what Brendan guessed she thought was a seductive manner, and let her eyes travel his length as if the answer lay in the way he looked. Eventually she said, "somewhere north."

Brendan forced the grin on his face to grow wider. He let her have it. Technically he was from the North of Dublin. "Sure."

Sarah opened her mouth again as if to say something, but at that moment Brendan's phone buzzed in his right pocket. He gave the girl an apologetic smile, and she made a remark about getting back to a girlfriend. He had to hand it to her; she knew how to fish for information. He didn't answer her, but instead looked at his phone screen where he had gotten a text message from Warren.

_From: Warren Fox  
__U'r supposed 2 b lookin 4 JH.  
Not tryin 2 get in2 sum bird's knickers!_

Brendan looked up and around to see where the hell Warren could see him from, but before he managed to even make one quick glance around the room his phone buzzed again.

_From: Warren Fox  
__She is fit tho._

Okay, Brendan had enough. Warren was right in the first text; he wasn't here to get laid, and it wasn't the girl that was supposed to be fishing for information. He tucked his phone back in his pocket, and looked at Sarah who was still eyeing him up with a worryingly predatory gaze. It made his skin crawl.

He cleared his throat and got down to the task, "So... where's the guest of honour?"

"You mean Joey? He's about somewhere. Haven't actually seen much of him today, and it's his party. How do you know him?"

Why was everyone so concerned with how he knew the arsehole? He gave the same answer he gave the kid from earlier, "I'm a friend. Thought I'd see how he's doing with all this drama."

"Well I'm not sure where he is, but I think his brother is outside. He'll know."

His brother. Steven.

Brendan couldn't remember seeing the kid outside, he only saw the small group of men, and the boy definitely wasn't there. It seemed like Sarah, here, could read minds as well as move her body like water. She cocked her head towards a door in the kitchen that he hadn't noticed earlier. It had those long beaded hangings on it covering its length, and Brendan wondered how he'd get through without having the thing actually touch him.

He lifted his beer and tipped it towards the girl before allowing a large dose of it to gulp down his throat. He slowly walked over to the girl and placed the beer bottle on the counter by her hips, making her part her red coated lips to allow a sliver of teeth into view as way of response. She was trying to be seductive. He gave the girl one last smile and whispered something about seeing her in a bit, then her turned and he went straight to the door opening it using his shoulders. He wanted as much less skin as possible touching anything inside this house.

There were a few people outside including the woman with the pink tracksuit on from earlier. She was sitting on an old lawn chair nursing a can of beer. The pink flush marks on her neck and face told Brendan that she'd obviously been drinking a while. She was engrossed in conversation with a bloke that looked even more out of place here than Brendan. He was wearing a suit and was talking animatedly with her, maybe trying to make her understand something. It didn't take long for Brendan to guess that the guy was probably Joseph's solicitor telling the woman about his chances. What he needs to do, what he needs to say, how he should behave to get away scot free with his crime.

Brendan, without even being aware, took a step forward towards them. He wasn't thinking about what he was doing, but all of a sudden he felt the need to ask how this man could defend someone like Joseph. Before he could take a second step Brendan's phone buzzed again. This time it was one long continuous vibration telling him that it was a phone call. He turned his back to the woman and the solicitor as he dug his phone out to see Warren's name plastered across the screen.

"You found him?" Brendan demanded before Warren could say anything.

He heard a low grumble of laughter on the other end of the phone, and it was soon followed with the heavily loaded word "yep."

"Where?" Brendan could already feel the adrenaline pumping through his veins.

"I'm not gonna tell you just yet."

"What the fuck, Warren?" Was he playing a game? Was he here to screw with Brendan rather than Joseph?

"Hold on," Warren laughed again. Brendan would have to sort that. Possibly punch the laughter out of him. "A) You're fucking crazy, Brady. We don't need you barging in here, all guns blazing. Or in this case everything in my tool box blazing. B) I heard his solicitor is here. If you beat the crap out of him while the guy defending him in court against your sister sees, then you can guarantee that _he'll _get away, and _you'll_ get locked up."

Brendan hated it when Warren spoke sense. It so rarely happened, but it grated him when it did. "So, what do you suggest we do then?"

There was silence on the other side of the phone for a few seconds before Warren came to a decision. Warren would observe Joseph for a while longer to see if they could get an opportunity to get him alone. If not today, then soon. Brendan on the other hand, would have to suck it up for the time being, try to not let the anger in him that was slowly beginning to boil over explode and cause mass destruction. He hung up the phone with a grunt of frustration, and jammed it back into his pocket. If he didn't have some sort of outlet soon he feared that his ears would start bleeding from the hindrance of being able to punch Joseph square in the throat.

Brendan was imaging the thousand inhumane things he'd like to do Joseph when he felt a light tap on his shoulder. He turned around and had to physically stop himself from being knocked back by the blue of the eyes that stared back at him.

"Steven." He managed to choke out, then cleared his throat and said more clearly, "Steven."

The lad smiled. He did that a lot. This smiling thing. With everything going on the kid continued to smile. It was always the genuine type too. Not the kind that Brendan threw around, the kind that made him appear to be smiling but really, he was thinking of ways he could get the other person to shut up without having to rip their tongue out.

"Yep, that's me name. Although everyone calls me Ste." He said while scratching the top of his head, and looked over Brendan's shoulder at his mother as if to make sure she wasn't watching him speaking to Brendan. He wondered whether Steven's mother was worried about what he'll say to who, and maybe accidently reveal his brother's transgressions.

"Yeah, but like I said, I prefer Steven." Brendan spoke drawing the boy's attention back to him. If they needed to know where Joseph would be at what time alone, then Joseph's dearest brother was their best chance in finding out. That bird inside, Sarah, said Steven would know where Joseph was which means the brothers must be close. Steven would know things about him that others didn't. Maybe he even knew the real truth about his brother, and that's why his mother didn't like him talking to anyone that they'd never seen before. If he couldn't beat the truth out of Joseph, then maybe he could get his brother to reveal it. Build some sort of rapport between them; get him to confide in Brendan.

The boy simply shrugged at Brendan's refusal to call him Ste and nodded towards the house, "you want a drink. Can't promise anything that doesn't taste like toilet water though."

Brendan raised an incredulous eyebrow, "You've tasted toilet water?"

"What?"

"Well it's impossible to say something tastes like toilet water unless you've tasted the actual thing to compare it to. So…. have you tasted toilet water?" Brendan kept his face completely straight making it seem like he was deadly serious in his enquiries.

The boy's smile grew wider and he even sniggered a little, "You're one of those, huh?"

"One of what?"

"Snobby intellects. You knew what I meant, but you felt the need to take it literally to make me feel stupid." The boy definitely wasn't stupid. He was smarter than he looked. And he wasn't finished, "I bet you've been walking around me house with your nose in the air, looking at every crack and broken thing, thinking what a shit hole this is, not wanting to touch a single thing. Bet you opened the door by pulling your jumper over your hand to turn the door knob."

He was doing it again. Reading Brendan like a fucking open book. Brendan couldn't deny judging the place and the people here, and he was starting to realise fast that whatever he thought about Steven, he'd have to reassess his results. This boy was uncomfortably observant. It may be Brendan that knew Steven's name, but it was the boy that seemed to be the more knowledgeable one here.

"There's a certain irony to you judging me about being judgemental." Brendan told Steven, hoping that he could turn the attention away from himself and towards the boy.

"Maybe. But hey, I drink from the toilet, what do I know? So, do you wanna a beer or what?" Steven headed towards the house to get them both drinks, but Brendan didn't like how he felt like a bad guy here.

He called after Steven, "Seeing as you're so good at reading people, what am I thinking now?"

Steven was a good five feet away from Brendan when he turned around and scrunched his face up to see him through the dark. He didn't say anything for a while, seemingly observing Brendan as if he really _was_ reading his mind. Eventually he said, "You're thinking, in a house full of people what am I doing talking to you."

Brendan raised an eyebrow even though he doubted the boy could actually see it. The lights from the house were illuminating the backyard, but they both stood fairly in the dark. He turned his head up towards the sky and gave a short laugh. "I wasn't, but I am now."

Steven sighed his response, "okay, what was you thinking then?"

Brendan allowed a small smile to remain on his face to make sure the boy knew he was serious when he said, "I was thinking that I _don't_ think you're stupid."

"Well, you'd be the first." Steven's response was blasé. He wasn't trying to gain any sort of sympathy from Brendan, he was just stating something that simply was. He turned back towards the house after that, not really expecting a response from Brendan and walked in.

Brendan looked around at the garden for the first time now. It wasn't that big; typical size of a council house. The grass had overgrown and there were weeds everywhere. Brendan wondered if anyone took care of anything here. He realised that he was being judgemental again, observing every little broken thing like the boy had said, but he couldn't get his head round how someone could live in such a dump.

He walked forward and around to the side of the house where Steven must've originally been hanging out. It was out of view from anyone who had directly come out of the house explaining why he hadn't seen Steven when he stepped out. It was also out of view from his mother, or anyone else for that matter. Steven must've heard Brendan's voice when he was speaking to Warren on the phone a little earlier and had come to investigate. Brendan couldn't remember what exactly he said to Warren on the phone, but he couldn't have said anything incriminating otherwise the boy would not have abandoned his solitude to come speak to him. He found himself contemplating what the boy had suggested he was thinking earlier; in a house full of people, some of whom must be the boy's friends, why was the boy hanging about by himself. More to the point, why had the lad decided to speak to him and ignore everyone else?

There was a chair where Steven must've of been sitting with his back to the wall, and on the ground beside it were 3 empty cider cans, but it was what was resting on the chair that caught Brendan's attention. There was a notepad and a cookbook resting on the seat with a pen inside the pad bookmarking the page Steven must've been writing on. Brendan picked up the notepad and opened it at the marked page, and inside it seemed the boy had copied down recipes, except it was hard to tell with the amount of scribbling out he had done. Some of the pages had been scribbled out with such aggression that the paper tore and the page below had scribbles too. Words like soufflé had been written out multiple times in different spellings before the correct one was used. It went _suflay; sooflay, suflae, souflay, soufflé._ Steven must've really dug the pen into the paper when he wrote it; the paper didn't tear through, but he managed to carve the word into the next page too.

"What d'you think you're doing?" The snap of the voice came from behind Brendan and he jumped a little, dropping the book back onto the chair. Brendan barely had the time to turn his head to look at Steven before he stormed his way up to him and grabbed the notepad off the chair.

"You shouldn't leave stuff lying around if you don't want anyone to find it." He was being rude, he knew that, but he wasn't about to apologise to a Hay boy.

"So what, I can't leave my own stuff lying around in my own garden without having strangers snooping?" Steven was getting himself worked up for no fucking reason. It's not like he just read the kid's diary. It was a fucking list of words.

"Not at a party, no. What's the fucking big deal, anyway?"

Steven cocked his head to the side and said, "Does it look like the part extended to this part of the garden?"

"Well I guess you should've put up a sign that said, _'off limits' _then."

Steven tutted at Brendan, then barged past him making sure he bumped hard into Brendan's shoulder, and he took the notepad and beers that he'd brought out for them with him. Brendan inwardly cursed himself. So much for building a rapport and getting the kid to slip up on him, Brendan had well and truly pissed the lad off.

Brendan picked up the cookbook that Steven had left on the chair, put it on the ground, and sat on the seat instead. He stretched his legs out crossing it at the ankles, folded his arms, and leaned his head back against the wall. He needed to think of a way to get close to the boy without creating suspicion, or apparently invading his privacy and winding him up. Brendan was thinking maybe he should apologise after all when he heard Steven's voice again.

"Making yourself comfortable are you?" He was standing at a distance from Brendan, but he could still see the scowl on the boy's face. He had his arms crossed with a can of beer in each hand. Brendan smiled at him innocently hoping it told the boy that he didn't want another argument and Steven got it. His face cleared and he dropped his hand to the side, "I forgot to give you your drink."

Brendan sat up on his seat and regarded the boy. He couldn't understand how this kid could be Joseph's brother. He was so…likable. Brendan internally kicked himself and forced himself to remember that Steven was on Joseph's side. Steven believed his sister was a liar. He was not likable. He was just as bad as his brother, because he _chose_ to stand by him. Brendan had to remember that.

Steven slowly walked up to him and tossed the can of beer at him. Brendan caught it with ease with his left hand , tipped it forward and gave Steven a , _'I hope we're cool', _smile. "Thank you, Steven."

Steven shrugged and leaned back against the house putting one foot on the wall and opened his can, scrunching up his face as if he expected the thing to overflow when he opened it. It didn't. He took a long sip of the drink, and Brendan couldn't help raising an impressed eyebrow. He was about to suck it up and apologise to him for reading whatever the fuck that was that made him so mad, but Steven had finished drinking and got in first.

"Look I'm sorry for that, yeah. Maybe I did overreact a bit, but… that was personal." He didn't look at Brendan; he just stared ahead at the wall of the house next door. Everyone from that house must've been here; everyone from the entire estate must've been here.

"Don't worry about it. What was it, anyway? Looked like a recipe." Brendan put the can of beer on the ground beside him and turned in the chair, so his body was facing Steven even though the lad still refused to look his way.

"Wasn't a recipe. I was practicing how to spell some of the dishes." Hence the multiple crossing out of words. It didn't take long for Brendan to realise that Steven was probably dyslexic, and it was a sensitive topic for the boy; the reason he was so mad at Brendan for looking at it, the reason he thought he was stupid, or why others might've called him that.

"Hey, at least you got there in the end."

"Didn't. I got fed up and copied the word from the book." That explained why he pressed hard into the paper when he wrote the correct spelling. He was angry he couldn't get it right on his own.

Brendan thought he'd change the subject; Steven was obviously not comfortable with this one. "So, what are you doing sitting on your own during a party in _your_ house? Shouldn't you be getting drunk with your mates in some corner?"

Steven shrugged, "They're not my mates. I mean Amy is here, but she's somewhere upstairs drooling over Joey." The mention of Joseph from the boy's mouth made something turn in his stomach. "Rae was supposed to come, but her Nan fell down the stairs, so she's looking after her." The boy dropped these names like Brendan knew who the hell they were. He didn't. He didn't know anyone here.

"Your brother knows a fuck load of people. I came out here just to get some breathing space." He came out here looking for the boy, but he wasn't about to admit that.

Steven laughed and turned around finally to look at Brendan. "Never doubt the power of curiosity. They're all here to snoop. Bit like you."

Brendan had a moment of panic where he thought the boy had sussed him out. Sussed out that now, as he was having to delay killing Joseph, he was here to get information out of the boy. He opened his mouth to tell Steven he had no idea what he was talking about when he smiled and said, "I'm kidding."

Brendan hoped the sigh of relief that he did wasn't too noticeable.

Steven slid down the wall and sat on the floor, he had knees up, and his arms rested on them with his beer can hanging from one hand. Before he realised what he was even doing Brendan stood up, moved the chair out of the way, and mirrored the boy's position beside him.

"There's a perfectly good chair going to waste there."

Brendan shrugged and opened his own can of beer and took a sip from it, but almost instantly spat it right back out. Steven beside him let out a laugh that didn't sound quite like it came out of a human being. It was agonisingly loud, loud enough that a head popped out from a window above them to see where the noise was coming from, and what the hell it was. After realising it was only the kid, the head popped back in loudly exclaiming to the room they occupied how it was only Steven being Steven. The blare the lad made when he laughed sounded slightly like an over excited hiccupping donkey, and for reasons Brendan couldn't explain, the sound made him smile. He suppressed it and instead observed the can of beer like it had physically abused him before looking at the boy with a face of utter disgust. "You weren't wrong. This stuff tastes like shit."

"I said it tastes like toilet water, but it's nice to know that you've tasted shit. You know, to compare it to." The boy had sass. He liked that.

No. Ne he didn't like that. He didn't like anything.

"Oh ha ha. You're a comedian. You should give up your day job." Brendan puts the can down between his legs and looked away from it, so it couldn't offend him any longer. "How can you drink that?"

The boy took another long sip of his drink; a metaphorical way of saying, _you pussy. _When he was done he made an over the top sound of satisfaction as if he had just drank the most refreshing water after years of dehydration. "Maybe some of us just aren't as uptight as you."

"Okay, I get the message. I'm snobby. I'm judgemental. I'm uptight." Brendan realised he was giving off a bad impression of himself, maybe not a completely incorrect impression, but a bad one none the less. Yet, Steven was here. Talking to him despite coming across like a complete fucking arsehole who, within knowing the kid for less than an hour, had already managed to have one argument with him.

"There must be something about me that doesn't want to make you chuck your drink all over me?" It was more a question than a statement, because Brendan wanted to know. Brendan wanted to know why this kid who he was supposed to hate by principle was sitting here drinking cheap beer with him on the ground when he could've been hanging about with the rapist brother he loved so much. "Is it my unnervingly blue eyes that have you rooted to the spot? It sure isn't my personality that you seem to be enjoying,"

He did it again. That laugh of his that made Brendan want to tear his own ear drums out, and shove it down the boy's throat, yet it made something inside of his stomach shift. Something that made him feel masochistic in wanting to hear it more, wanting the ear splitting sound to fill up some kind of void in him. A void that he wasn't aware existed, nor how it got there, or what it meant. It was just there, and this kid did funny things to it. Brendan found himself feeling annoyed with Steven, He had no business having any sort of effect on him regardless of whether Brendan could pinpoint what the effect actually was.

Steven put down his beer and made a show of analysing Brendan's eyes. He cocked his head to the right, and Brendan held his breath as Steven allowed blue eyes to meet blue eyes. He wasn't sure how long the kid sat there staring, but if he didn't say something soon Brendan would need medical attention. Suddenly Steven huffed low laughter, not his usual sound, but more of an embarrassed chuckle like maybe; just maybe he'd been holding his breath too.

"Nope, don't think it's your eyes. Must be something else. Maybe I like your accent. Irish, right?"

Crap. The girl earlier hadn't put two and two together, but what if Steven did. Suzie or Sarah or whatever her name was couldn't even specify where his accent was from, but Steven could. Was this his way of hinting that he knew exactly who Brendan was and wouldn't tell him a damned thing. Brendan didn't know what to say, and he stared at Steven waiting for the boy to tell him that he's got him all sussed out.

However when Steven spoke again, it wasn't to tell him to go fuck off. "I know a couple of other people who are Irish. Do you know Kris?" Steven turned his head left then right, looking to see if anyone was listening to their conversation. They were alone, but the boy still lowered his voice when he said, "he likes to dress like a girl." Then he started laughing again, the hiccupping donkey laugh, holding his stomach, doubling over, and dropping his beer allowing any remnant to spill on the ground. "Er-yar, I dropped me beer."

Brendan couldn't deny being amused by the boy's now obviously drunken state. Jesus, how many of these cheap beers had the boy had all by himself before Brendan had turned up. He picked up the beer can, and put both his and Steven's by his side away from the boy's reach, then he reached over to pull the still laughing boy upright. Once back in a sitting position Steven stopped laughing almost instantaneously, and Brendan realised just how close his face was to Steven's. He was just supposed to help the boy up then get back to his original position, but he didn't move. He stayed there and allowed the drunken boy's eyes to travel down to his lips before shifting back to meet his eyes, and Brendan couldn't move a damn muscle to push the boy away. No, instead his eyes moved down to look at the boy's lips too; they were glistening and pink, even through the dark.

And then suddenly Steven was leaning forward, coming further into Brendan space, and as Brendan finally gathered enough will power to shove the boy away did he realise, the boy was leaning forward because he was about to throw up. All over Brendan.

"Jesus!" Brendan heard himself shout as he managed to get up and away from the hurling kid just in time.

When he was done emptying what looked like alcohol in an empty stomach, he mumbled, "Shit, Terry's gonna kill me." Then he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and looked up at Brendan. "So, Kris, you know him?"

Brendan couldn't help laughing at the boy; he had just thrown up, missing Brendan by millimeters, and he was picking up the conversation where he left it as if there wasn't a puddle of sick between his legs.

"No, I don't know Kris." Except he did. He was Malachy Fisher's younger brother who's real name was Francis and was the talk of the town, a strain on his poor mother's catholic little heart. Nobody wanted a queer for a son, let alone a queer who dressed like a woman. Malachy was in Brendan's year in school, and yet another of Cheryl's crushes. Yeah, he knew Kris or Francis or whatever, but he wasn't about to tell Steven that.

"Yeah, he sounds different to you. Actually all the Irish people I know sound different to you." Steven stood up then, slightly tipsy on his feet and Brendan reached out to steady him, but before he could even touch him again, the boy stood up straight. He hushed his voice again when he said, "There's this girl. She's got dark hair, kind of pale like you," Brendan rolled his eyes at that, "came to my house two weeks ago. Her name was Laura or Louise, something like that, and she had an accent like Kris."

He was talking about Lynsey. Cheryl's best friend. This meant Steven was in the house when Cheryl went over, and possibly even when that bastard attacked her. As if it had a life of its own, Brendan's fist clenched itself. He was going to hit something. Someone.

But then Steven spoke again, "So did the girl she was with."

Cheryl. His baby sister, Cheryl. His baby sister who was at home , too scared to step foot outside of their house. Brendan's nails dug so far into his palm he was sure he drew blood, but he wasn't here to spill his own. The fact that Steven was here when it all happened made Brendan feel sick. Maybe Steven saw it all happen and let it go on; let his brother hurt his baby sister. Maybe Steven even helped; guarded the door and ignored his sister's cries for help.

It was time to stop being all chummy with the kid and get some decent information from him. Brendan had been sat here for some time now, and he knew nothing that would bring him closer to getting Joseph alone, or anything that would incriminate him.

Damn Steven wasn't finished talking though, "Are you related to Laura, you look like her?"

Inside Brendan screamed. _LYNSEY, HER NAME IS LYNSEY. DO YOU REMEMBER MY SISTER'S NAME, OR IS SHE JUST THE OTHER GIRL? _On the outside Brendan let a tight smile cover his mouth and said, "No. We don't sound the same remember."

"Oh yeah." Steven's eyes widened with realisation.

This was his chance. Brendan needed to Bring up Joseph, "Talking of siblings, where's your brother?"

Steven shrugged, "Dunno. I left him to it when his friends came over."

"You guys not close?" This was a pointless activity if Steven didn't know much about his brother.

Steven explained, "We are. Him and Amy are me best friends. But I don't like his friends that much, and I didn't want to hang around with them." Brendan wanted to ask what it was about Joseph's friends he didn't like, but apparently the boy wasn't a big fan of the subject of his brother. "Anyway, I said something nice about you now it's your turn. In a party full of drunken girls and alcohol, why have you chosen to sit in a secluded area with your _friend's_ little brother not drinking anything?" He emphasized the word friend as if he still didn't believe Brendan about that.

"Firstly, I'm not drinking because, as we've established, the alcohol tastes like something you'd poison a rat with." Steven laughed whilst moving over to where Brendan had put the chair and sat down. Brendan waited before he continued, "and I'm not a fan of parties. I came here to see your brother, couldn't find him, was about to leave when you offered me a drink, and now here I am." Brendan outstretched his arms to hammer home his point.

"You still haven't said a nice thing about me." Steven folded his arms and slouched down on the chair, looking at Brendan with a raised eyebrow.

Brendan sighed and walked up to the boy until he was in front of him, towering over him. He observed the boy closely, took in the loose jeans he was wearing with the white polo T-shirt, and a blue hoodie on that lay unzipped. He wasn't wearing the same outfit earlier. Earlier he'd been wearing grey tracksuit bottoms and an oversized black hoodie, he remembered because Steven looked like he was being swallowed by his clothes. However he wore the same shoes, the same battered trainers.

What did he like about the boy? He couldn't put his finger on it, and it frustrated him. "I like that you don't even know me, but you're not scared to tell me what you think of me." Was that it? Was that what he liked about the boy, or was it just something to say? Even as he questioned himself he knew that yes, yes he did like the boy's - _I'm not gonna take your shit -_ attitude.

Steven broadly grinned at Brendan seemingly proud and pleased with the compliment Brendan had offered him, and as he opened his mouth to say something, the kid was always saying something, Steven's phone rang. He jumped a little not expecting the interruption and looked around as if he wasn't aware where the sound was coming from. Brendan tilted his head to a side, and with an amused expression pointed at the pocket the sound was coming from.

Steven dug his phone out of his jeans and looked at the screen to check who it was, then he looked at Brendan and turned the screen, so he could see too. "Look, it's your friend calling." The screen was overtaken by the name Joey, and a picture of Joseph with his arm around Steven, both of them with a smile that was too large on their faces, popped up. Steven dragged the phone back from Brendan's view and answered it with a, "hiya, what's up?"

Brendan couldn't decipher what Joseph was saying on the other end, but he could hear the low rumble of his voice. The very fact that it was Joseph on the other end, the very fact that Joseph was a tangible entity that was within his vicinity, but so out of reach made Brendan want to lash out. Lash out at the nearest person to him, and the closest person to Joseph. It was only fair right, an eye for an eye. A tooth for a tooth. A sibling for a sibling.

Steven had walked a fair few feet away from Brendan, and had his back to him to create some illusion of a private conversation, but Brendan could still hear him, "No, I'm just outside." He took a pause to let Joseph speak, then said, "with a mate." Pause. "Nah, you don't know him." Pause. "Shut up, Joey." He laughed into the phone, and Brendan could hear the unmistakable sound of laughter on the other end too. That did it. Brendan marched forward towards Steven with every intent to pummel his fist straight into the boy's ribs, break a few if he could. By the time he had reached Steven he had hung up the phone and turned around, looking at Brendan with a smile, and Brendan stopped in his track.

"What was that about?" He asked instead.

"Oh, Joey was just wondering where I was cos he hasn't seen me all night." He answered as he slipped his phone back into his front pocket and walked past Brendan to sit back down on the chair.

"You told him you were with a friend. A friend he wouldn't know." Brendan hadn't missed that. He had told the boy he was a friend of Joseph's, and the boy had now made it clear that he didn't believe that for shit.

"Well he doesn't know you, does he?" There was no smile no malice just an expression of matter of fact.

"No," Brendan replied truthfully. There was no use lying. The kid knew, he'd always known. "No he doesn't.

Steven nodded his head knowingly, "thought not." And that was it. He didn't further question Brendan's motive for being here, nor why he lied about being Joseph's friend. Instead he sat there, tilted his head back, and looked up at the sky.

Brendan wanted to say something, but he wasn't sure what he could say. Luckily his own phone buzzed signalling a text message. Steven turned his attention back to Brendan, and he imitated Brendan's earlier actions as he tilted his head to the side and pointed at his pocket.

Brendan showed him his middle finger, making the boy laugh, and got his phone out. There was a missed call and voice mail from Eileen. A text from Anne and a text from Warren. Warren's message was new, but the rest he had somehow missed. How did that happen?

_From: Warren Fox  
__I'm outta here. Meet u at the car.  
__Thnk they sussed me. Asked too many Qs._

"Who is it?" Steven asked.

Brendan looked up from his phone at Steven with an eyebrow raised, "Nosy little fella, aren't you?"

Steven shrugged.

"It's my mate. I've gotta go." Brendan stuffed his phone back in his pocket, and when he glanced back up he wondered if he imagined the disappointed expression on the kid's face.

Steven swallowed, "oh right."

"Well, this has been fun, but all good things must come to an end." He nodded once at the boy and made his way to walk past him and out of the property. It looked like you could get to the front yard through this way, and he didn't want to go back in that house. However as he reached the edge of the house, near to the front he turned, and looked back at Steven who was watching him go. "Maybe we can hang out again sometime. You can tell me what a snobby bastard I am." Had he planned to say that? Had he planned to have any further contact with the boy?

Brendan told himself he was playing the long game. He couldn't build a rapport with the kid in a day. He couldn't get the kid to betray his brother's trust to a bloke he'd just met, and so he needed to play this out. He needed to see the kid again, so he could build trust between them and get the boy talking. This way he'd have a chance to hurt Joseph not just physically, but emotionally too; have his own brother be the reason for his downfall. That was it, that was why Brendan asked to see the boy again.

Steven stood up and made his way to Brendan all the while saying, "I don't know. Right now you're in a house full of people. You might be an axe murderer, or someone out to hurt me."

Brendan laughed as if the idea was ludicrous, as if the he hadn't thought of hurting Steven to hurt Joseph. "Kid, I've been sat here alone with you for a while now. If I wanted to hurt you, don't you think I'd have already bashed your skull in with a wrench?"

"Why a wrench?" Steven asked.

Because he had one burning a hole in his pocket begging to be used. "Just the first thing that came to my head."

Steven considered him. Brendan thought maybe Steven would deny him after all, but then he said, "You give me your number, and maybe I'll want to hang out with you one day."

"Just maybe?"

"I might wake up tomorrow and think, 'bleeding hell, that guy was a right loser yesterday'."

"Me? Loser? Says the boy who was practicing spelling while there is a party going on." Brendan pointed out.

Steven laughed. It made Brendan smile. "Are you gonna give me your number or what?"

Brendan nodded his head, and Steven brought his phone out and tapped in Brendan's number as he recited the digits. "So, don't go calling me in the middle of the night when you suddenly remember how incredible I am"

Steven made a face that said, '_don't flatter yourself',_ and Brendan was about to walk away again when Steven asked, "What should I save it under?"

"What?" Brendan hadn't thought to give the kid a name.

"You haven't told me your name, have you?" Steven told him as if Brendan was the most dense person he'd ever met.

"Oh yeah, save it under…" He tried to think of a name. Any name, but his own. Warren. Danny. Eoghan. Jesus fucking Christ. "Save it under Brendan."

Shit. Would he recognise the name?

He didn't. And when Brendan turned, and finally walked away from the kid he heard him mutter, "Bren" as he typed the name into his phone.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

Ste sat up in his bed finally giving up any attempts of sleep after about three hours of constant tossing. He reached over to his bedside cabinet for his phone so he could read what godforsaken time it was. Four thirty. Great. He'd have to be up for college in about three hours and he didn't want to go in looking like the walking dead. Looking exhausted would mean he looked stressed, and looking stressed would mean he looked like he had something to hide. He didn't. They, Joey and himself, didn't. He debated not going in at all, but that would look like he was avoiding going in so he wouldn't have to face all of Cheryl Brady's friends, face the music. Ste had to suck it up. Joey was innocent, and he had to make sure people knew that.

Ste shoved his duvet cover to one side sending a shock of chill through him forcing goosebumps to rise on his skin. He turned in his bed, so he was still sitting down, but now with his feet on the ground, and looked at the sleeping figure on his bedroom floor. It was too dark in the room to make out Joey's actual features, but he could see the outline of his face as it rested on his pillow to a side. He was sleeping on the blow up mattress that seemed to have a tendency to deflate during the night meaning Joey would wake up with aches all over his body. Ste had told him multiple times that they could swap around until his room was available again. One night Ste on the floor and other nights Joey. However on their second night when it was Ste's turn on the floor, Joey got to the mattress first and pretended he was asleep until Ste was too comfortable in his bed to want to swap, and then, only then did Joey bid him good night.

It was their third night now, and Joey had yet again done the same thing, Ste couldn't get his head round why Joey just couldn't let Ste have the floor once in a while. It wasn't like Ste was getting any sleep, anyway. He hated to admit it even to himself, but he was worried about going to college. What had happened between Cheryl Brady and his brother had somehow started a rivalry in their school that extended to all years, even the secondary school kids knew about it and had a side that they had picked. It was nobody's business and Ste just wanted them to stay out of it, even the ones that claimed to be on Joey's side. They didn't need an army of defenders; people willing to get into fights to save Joey face. Joey had done nothing wrong, and so his innocence would mean his charges would be dropped, and all this aggro would be for no reason.

Ste couldn't hate those supporting Cheryl, she sold a convincing story, and when fighting her battles they truly believed they were fighting a cause. There shouldn't be any sides. There should be only the Bradys and the Hays; everyone else should back the fuck off. This was all Cheryl's fault, Ste just wanted her to tell the truth, let them just return to normal. He understood that she always liked the attention, liked being someone everyone talked about, but did she really want to be talked about like this. Not to mention, when the truth would come out she would be stigmatised as the girl who lied about being attacked and was about to send an innocent bloke to prison, have him on the sex offenders list, and make it almost impossible for him to have any sort of life when it came time for him to return.

Ste heaved himself up and as quietly as possible, made his way to the bathroom, he didn't need the loo, but it was something to do. The house was completely dark, so when he entered the bathroom and switched the light on, the brightness of it felt almost blinding. He put an arm to cover his eyes and switched the light off again. It looked like he'd have to pee in the dark, something that he was used to doing without making a mess. If Terry had a really bad episode Ste would make it his mission to remain as unnoticeable as possible which meant he had to walk around the dark in case switching on a light would wake him up. Bring attention to him. Attention he'd rather not have.

He washed his hands, and with his eyes now accustomed to the dark, he stood in front of the mirror that was attached to the bathroom cabinet above the sink. He still couldn't see much, but the whites of his eyes were visible, and when he bared his teeth he could see them too. Ste didn't really know why he stood there for countless minutes just observing what exactly he could see of himself in the dark, but he didn't want to go back in his bedroom. Here at night in the safety of the blackness of the room he could pretend none of what was going on was really happening. He could block out reality. Who would've thought that someone could find so much comfort in the dark, so much hope?

Ste squinted his eyes, trying to see how much of the white in his eyes he could cover before he couldn't see anything at all when a soft knock at the door had him spinning around. Joey was stood in the doorway, his head leaning on the frame looking at Ste as if he were crazy. He must've been stood there for quite a while watching Ste make all sorts of expressions in the mirror, twisting his face this way and that.

"What are you doing up, Joey?" Ste asked hoping his brother wouldn't mention how weird he was.

Joey grinned knowingly; he was aware Ste didn't want any attention on himself, so he'd probably do everything in his power to make him as uncomfortable as possible. Joey stood up straight, walked further into the bathroom and turned the light on. Light flooded the small room, forcing all illusion broke away, and reality reared its ugly head, bringing with it the impossibility of denial. Joey was going to be in court soon facing rape charges, and Ste might lose him for a very long time, or maybe forever. If Joey went to prison he might not be the same guy when he came out.

Ste squinted for a while, and then forced himself to keep his eyes open so they could get used to the light while Joey put the toilet lid down and sat on top of it. "I could ask you the same question, little brother."

Ste huffed, sat on the edge of the bathtub and crossed his arms, looking at Joey with a frown on his face. "Can't I even take a slash without you wondering where I am?"

"Hey, I wake up in the middle of the night and you're missing. Given the history, my first thought is that Dad has killed you and buried you in the garden." Joey was seemingly joking, but he didn't realise that he was actually voicing Ste's fears. "It's only natural for me to worry, and who knows how much longer I'll be here to protect you." Ste could feel the pulse in his throat hammering. He hadn't thought of that. If Joey was sent away, then Ste would have no one, and Terry would be able to do what he pleased with Ste. Other than Joey, no one would even care enough to wonder where he was if he did disappear. Maybe Amy would, but she was too scared of Terry to do anything about it. If Joey was sent away Ste would well and truly be alone.

Joey must've read the fear in his face, because he was now crouching in front of Ste and gripping his face so he could look at him, "hey, I'm only kidding. If I do get sent away I'll still make sure you're okay. I'll make sure by the time you're eighteen you're out of here."

Ste hated how even at a time like this Ste was in the forefront of Joey's concerns. He forced a smile on his face and told him that he was being daft. There was no way Joey was going to prison, he was innocent, and the courts would see that too. They wouldn't send an innocent bloke to prison, stuff like that didn't happen.

Joey knew Ste was deluding himself, Ste knew he was deluding himself, but neither said anything. Ste sat there silently pleading Joey to reassure him, but the older boy remained silent. He wasn't going to lie to Ste, but he didn't quite have the heart to tell him he was wrong either. Instead he looked at him pityingly, and Ste thought that was somehow worse than telling him he was wrong, that innocent men do go to prison. The look made him feel like a child. A child that was about to lose everything he held dear, but still believed that somehow everything would be restored, that maybe if he wished really hard on a falling star or a full moon, or maybe if he was good all year round, Santa or some force would make everything okay. The look didn't make him feel deluded or naïve, he knew he was those things, the look made him feel helpless.

Joey got up to sit next to Ste by the tub and put his arms around his younger brother. They sat like that for a moment, both lost in thought about their daunting futures before Ste couldn't take it anymore. He suddenly stood up forcing Joey to lose balance and fall silently into the tub before Ste reached out to stop him.

Joey chuckled slightly and mumbled, "always got my back eh, little brother? Stopping me from falling flat on my arse."

Ste couldn't force himself to smile let alone laugh along with Joey. He didn't have Joey's back, because right now Joey needed him, and there was nothing he could do to stop the domino free-fall that started ever since Cheryl Brady stepped foot into their home. Maybe he could stand up in court and tell the judge and jury that Cheryl Brady is a liar, and she wanted Joey that night just as much as he wanted her if not more. He could stand in court and change the direction of these dominos, but he couldn't stop them falling ,and eventually when the end came, no one would come out of this the same. Ste couldn't help but feel like these sequences of events were going to change his life forever.

"Why don't you let me save your back and sleep on the floor tonight?" Steven asked because there wasn't much more he could do.

"Nah, you're alright."

"Joey, why don't you let me do this for you? It's not much. A night here and a night there."

"Because this has nothing to do with you." Joey suddenly stood and was inches away from Ste's face. "This is my problem. I got that girl into our home. I fucked her knowing she was a brat, so it was me who messed up, and I'll sleep on the goddamned, fucking floor. It's bad enough you'll have to go through standing in court –"

"I want to. I want to make sure people hear our side." Ste interrupted him. He wanted, no, needed Joey to know he'll help him whatever way he could.

"_I_ don't want you to. There is no _our _side. Only mine. You shouldn't have to stand up there and let her fucking lawyers twist and turn everything you have to say. You shouldn't have to go through that. I don't want you to have to suffer because of my problems, so I am going to sleep on the fucking floor, okay?" He was shouting now, and there was spit flying onto Ste's face. He dared not move it away because he knew Joey was on the verge of tears, and any movement would set him off and he'd feel embarrassed about it. Ste was the one that cried and Joey prized himself in being the strong one for them.

Joey walked away first and started splashing water over his face in the sink. They didn't speak, but the shouting had woken up Terry and he was at the door, demanding they return to bed otherwise he'd rip their heads off. He stood in the hallway as Joey left the bathroom first and Ste followed. Apparently Ste was walking too slowly and it earned him a shove from Terry, making him fell hard on to Joey's back. Joey stumbled forward a bit, but managed to hold his balance as Terry again shoved Ste, but this time with his shoulder as he barged past him and grumbled, "fucking faggot."

Ste turned and moved to continue walking to his room, but he found Joey stood still, blocking the way, and glaring into the darkness where Terry had disappeared into. He was mad. He was mad that Terry would probably never stop shoving Ste around, and he was mad that he may not be here to stop it.

"Leave it, Joey." He didn't want Joey getting into a fight with Terry over him. He complained about how Cheryl Brady was his problem, but he never seemed to think twice before he threw himself into Ste's. Ste forcefully turned his brother around to get him moving again and Joey let him do it. That in itself was abnormal.

They both got back into bed, well Ste did and Joseph settled himself on the blow up mattress, but neither slept, they just stared at the ceiling above. The fucking mould infested, decaying ceiling.

Finally Joey broke the silence, "you going back to school tomorrow?"

"It's college, Joey and I don't know." He had planned to go, but he wasn't so sure anymore, not with Joey's rant.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot you're a big man now. No more secondary school." Ste chucked his pillow at Joey making him laugh before he chucked it back. He had better aim than Ste and the pillow hit him square in the face. "I think you should avoid it. I don't want you getting any aggro over me."

That made Ste's mind up. He always was a stubborn fucker. "Nah. I think I'll go in, me." He didn't look at Joey when he said this, but he could tell his brother was scowling at him. "We have no reason to hide, and the party proved that people do believe us. Plus she's already ruined your life –"

"Gee, thanks, little brother," Ste could practically feel the physical presence of Joey rolling his eyes. This was okay, when they acted like what she was doing to them; to him was a big joke.

"- I don't want her ruining mine too by making me miss out on education." Ste couldn't get through the entire sentence without laughing, and it wasn't long before Joey joined him.

They did that for a couple of minutes. Acted like all of this was no big deal, but eventually the laughter died out and yet again the silence spread over them like thick, suffocating smoke full of possibilities, possibilities that were all dire, and Ste was scared that they might not come out of it still breathing.

He needed to break this spell even if it was with the most pointless of comments. "Night, Joey."

"Night, Ste."

It didn't work. Maybe it wasn't the silence that was suffocating them after all.

Xxx

There was a rustling sound coming from somewhere in the room and Brendan didn't have enough energy to lift his head and check. Last night's alcohol consumption was coming back to haunt him, to taunt him that all good things come to an end. He managed to forget everything the night before when Katy had gone up to bed and asked Anne and him to lock up. The did, but they didn't leave after that. Instead they grabbed a bottle of whiskey, settled themselves into a booth, and drank away any coherent thought, making it impossible for them to worry much about anything other than standing up straight.

Before the third or fourth glass of whiskey Brendan briefly remembered Anne talking about Riley Costello, her second cousin, and how she wasn't sure if it was okay to fancy him. That was her excuse for drinking, drown her perverse thoughts away. Brendan smiled at how melodramatic she was being; if she thought crushing on her second cousin was perverse she should take a trip in Brendan's mind. Or perhaps not; she'd end up with liver failure. Brendan didn't say much of anything; he wasn't known for his way with words. He had always been the 'suffer in silence' type and that suited him fine. Suited Anne too, she might prefer it if Brendan opened up to her more, but she also liked to talk and Brendan had perfected the role of acting like he was listening to her.

So that's how it went last night. They drank till they couldn't see straight, then somehow Anne had enough sobriety left in her to call Warren to pick up Brendan. If Brendan had called Warren himself he would've told him to sleep in the streets, or made a sarcastic comment telling Brendan to just brave the streets himself and hope the good lord guides him home. What he would not have done is drag himself out of bed in the early hours, drive Brendan home, rummage through his pockets for his house keys, and put him to bed. Brendan suspected Warren had a thing for Anne, and the poor bloke was a slave to her curves.

Suddenly Brendan flung his eyes open. Warren had put him to bed. He was in his flat. None of Brendan's friends had come into his home, and that's exactly the way he liked it. He didn't want them here, and especially not when he was out of it and barely in control of his own body. From what Brendan could see he was in his own bedroom, but how did Warren know which room to put him in? He could've left him on the sofa, but he had somehow managed to figure out which room Brendan slept in. He lifted up his duvet cover to see if he was still in his Jeans and sweater from last night, but he wasn't. He was wearing boxers and no top. Had Warren undressed him? What if his father saw?

That thought had Brendan feeling like someone had poured water over his head, or maybe it was just the fact that someone _had_ poured water over his head.

"Jesus fucking Christ," Brendan exclaimed loudly as he jolted upright in bed.

"Finally!" Brendan heard what sounded annoyingly like Anne's voice from beside his bed, and when he turned to see, there she was. Smug as fuck with her arms crossed beneath her breasts, and a smile showing teeth so white it felt sand paper was being rubbed on his eyeballs. "What does it take for a girl to get some attention here? I was making so much noise I'm pretty sure there a few dead men walking around."

First Warren was in his flat and room, and now Anne. What the fuck was going on? Who was letting these people in here?

Anne made her way over to the curtains, hips swinging and everything, and flung them open allowing a burst of light to penetrate right through Brendan's skull and stab at every nerve ending. He cared whether Anne lived or died, he did, but at that moment he could've very well killed her and lived guilt free. What was she playing at? She knew very well that he'd have a hangover that morning, and sitting in the dark buried in his bed is exactly how he wanted to spend the day till he had to make an appearance at the pub. Having her all cheery at the crack of dawn is stuff that earns men life sentences in prison.

"What the fuck are you playing at Anne?" He growled at her as he shielded his eyes and tried to prevent himself from getting up and head butting her.

"It's noon. You should've been at work an hour ago."

Okay, maybe it wasn't the crack of dawn, but when you get to bed at god know what hour, noon feels like fucking well feels like it.

Brendan threw the now soaking duvet on the ground and got out of bed to observe the mess she had made. The pillow was drenched too, and he wondered how much water had she actually thrown over him. Looking around he noticed a bucket, a fucking bucket is what she used to throw water on him, because apparently she couldn't do the job using a glass like a normal person. He just hoped everything would be dry again by the time he had to get back in bed.

"Fucking hell, Anne. You've wet everything." Brendan stripped the pillow case and threw it at her face, then regretted it when he realised she'd probably put lipstick marks all over it.

"If you don't put some clothes on soon I know another thing that'll be getting -"

"Don't even." Brendan interrupted her. He was amused by her crude humour, but he didn't want to hear it. Not when he was feeling like one wrong movement or word would have him doubling over and throwing up in, what Anne made no hesitation in pointing out was, a freakishly neat room. She didn't carry on, and instead she showed off her wide smile, dimples and all and sashayed out of the room, announcing how she was making herself a cup of tea because Brendan was the least hospitable person ever.

He put on a pair of soft pants that he never really wore because, why the fuck would he need to? He slept in boxers, he wouldn't be caught dead wearing pants like these in public, and he always dressed himself for the day before he left his bedroom. It was a pair that Cheryl had gotten him when she went a bit crazy at some sale, and he had told her that there was a reason these were on discount, and that was because they were the ugliest fucking thing he'd ever seen. Still, he wore them now because he couldn't be arsed to wear jeans when he was feeling like anything that touched him had a thousand needles coming out of it. As he put on a vest over his head he heard the distinct sound of music coming from the living room. He was going to murder Anne today; he was really going to kill her.

"Anne, turn that fucking noise off!" He stormed out of his room, all ready to scream at Anne when he found her in the kitchen quietly making herself breakfast. She raised her perfectly plucked eyebrows at him, wordlessly telling him to watch his tone. She wasn't the one listening to music. Was Cheryl out of bed? He hadn't really seen her since Friday and maybe she'd made some progress during that time.

He left Anne in the kitchen and went to the living room to investigate, and he couldn't help the feeling of disappointment when he saw the back of the head of a dark headed girl.

"Lynsey, can you please turn that off." He quietly asked her. The fact that Cheryl was still cooped up in her room made him lose the energy to be aggressive. She turned around in her seat and gave him an apologetic smile before turning the music down. That's not what he asked her to do, he asked to her to turn it off completely. Does anyone listen to him anymore? Slightly annoyed now he asked her, "Lynsey, what are you doing here, shouldn't you be in college? Who the fuck is letting you people in here?"

"I see you're a ray of sunshine first thing when you wake up." Anne had spoken from behind him; she had finally finished helping herself to the kitchen cupboards and came into the living room with a tray with four mugs of tea, toast, strawberries, and croissants. She settled the tray onto the coffee table and made herself comfortable on the sofa taking a mug of tea with her. "Your dad let Lynsey in and went out, and she let me in." It was probably Lynsey that directed her to his room which surprised him, because he's heard Cheryl in conversation with Lynsey about how much of a slut they thought Anne was. Or maybe that was just Cheryl speaking, and Lynsey being Lynsey just agreed so as to keep Cheryl sweet. His sister really needed to work on her jealousy.

"It's my lunch break, so I thought I'd come and see Cheryl. See how she's doing." Of course it was her lunch break; Lynsey wasn't one to ditch college not when she wanted to be a doctor so bad. Brendan felt slightly guilty at being rude to her now even if she was used to it, spent far too much time around here not to be. However she was here to take care of her best friend, his sister, and he was more or less telling her she wasn't welcome right now. She was, she always was, but his tone didn't suggest that, and he knew he should show her his gratitude more often; she was doing more for his sister than he was. He swore to deliver her some sort of vengeance, and with all his macho glory, he couldn't even give her that.

He was glad Seamus was out. Ever since Cheryl's attack Seamus had been out a lot drinking. The drinking was nothing new, he always did that, but normally he'd settle on the sofa and drain an entire bottle of whiskey before knocking out on the sofa. Recently however, he took his drinking out and would have one of his cronies deliver him home. He'd stumble about the house waking Brendan up, and he would tentatively listen, with his heart in his throat, as Seamus made his way up the stairs and not towards his room.

Brendan realised he was slowly taking up his father's alcohol habits. Last night he'd gotten pissed and had to have Warren take him home; a mirror image of his father; he just prayed that's where the similarities ended. He hated himself enough without turning into the person that he despised most.

"Yeah, of course. Sorry. How is she doing?" Brendan asked Lynsey as he made his way to the kitchen for the jam jar.

He felt rather than saw Lynsey raise her eyebrows at him, and when he turned around that was exactly what he saw. She had completely turned around on the sofa, knees on the seat and was looking at Brendan like she couldn't believe him.

"You're asking _me_ how she is?" Brendan didn't think her eyebrows could go any higher, and yet when he shrugged his shoulders at her, she proved him wrong. "Brendan, you live with her. You're her brother."

"Wow Lynsey, I hadn't realised. Thank you for that enlightenment." He knew he shouldn't piss her off, she cared about Cheryl a lot, and it annoyed her that her own brother knew less about her than she did.

"_I," _she jabbed a finger at her chest,_ "_should be the one asking _you" _now she pointed the finger at Brendan, "how she is?"

She was right, but for some reason he couldn't get himself to go in her room. He had tried. When he came home after the party on Friday night he stood outside her room, trying to get himself to go in and check on her. He didn't know what his problem was, he'd gone in earlier that day, so what was stopping him now? Instead he waited outside her door until he heard her turn the tv off and silence descended. When he thought she had finally gone to sleep did he finally make his way to his own room.

He decided to act like the fact that he hadn't seen Cheryl since Friday was no big deal, "what can I say Lynsey, I thought you girls just stuck together all the time." Lynsey gave him one last judgemental glare before turning back to the tv. Jam jar in hand Brendan entered the living room again and ushered Anne closer to Lynsey so he could sit on the end. "If you're here to see Cheryl why are you down here giving me a migraine?"

"She won't let me in." Lynsey didn't move her eyes from the crap she was watching on the TV when she spoke. "Locked her door. I was waiting to ask you why, but you clearly don't know."

This was news to Brendan. Cheryl never locked her door, and Brendan found that out the hard and disturbing way. She would change her clothes with her door unlocked even after Brendan had pleaded with her to do so, telling her anyone could walk in. She always told him that if anyone would, it was going be him or their dad. She failed to realise that was exactly who he wanted her to hide herself from. Family didn't always mean security.

Brendan chewed on his bottom lip and frowned at nothing in particular, and from the corner of his eyes he could see Anne looking at him. When he couldn't take it anymore he finally turned to look at her, and before he could even ask her what she was staring at, she grabbed the fourth mug of tea with one hand,his arm with the other, and hauled him up from the sofa. For such a tiny, little lady she was freakishly strong. She dragged him to the kitchen and settled the mug on the breakfast bar before releasing his arm.

"Ah, watch it. You dug manicured nails into my flesh you vicious woman." He rubbed his now red arm and hoped to soothe the stinging.

Anne paid no attention to the assault she had committed against him, "take this tea and go see your sister."

Brendan instantly stopped rubbing his arm and looked up at the ceiling as if he could see Cheryl through it. He shook his head gently, "Can't. Late for work remember."

"My aunt doesn't care what time you turn up. She sent me over to check you were okay, not so I can drag you to work."

Brendan feigned hurt and put his palm flat to his chest where his heart was beating beneath it, "here I was thinking you cared."

She didn't take it as a joke. "Brendan I do care that's why I cancelled my brunch with Riley to come see you."Urgh, the infamous Riley. He didn't mention the fact that she's spent all last night talking about how she would keep herself away from him. "And it's because I care I'm telling you to go upstairs and face this guilt you seem to be having."

What? Who said anything about guilt? "Why would you think I'm feeling guilty about anything?"

"Because you said so." She looked at him like it was obvious. He couldn't remember telling her any such thing. Brendan made a mental note to never get drunk with Anne ever again. When his expression told her that he couldn't recall such an event she rolled her eyes and sat herself down on a stool. "You were drinking yourself silly -"

"Yeah, about that. Why am I the only one feeling like death?" Brendan interrupted her, half genuinely curious, and half wanting her to stop talking about what he could've possibly said in his drunken state.

"You're not. I'm just better at faking it."

Brendan wouldn't have been able to stop the grin taking over his face even if he tried. "That's… nice to know."

She slapped him on his arm, and if her tiny hand against his bare skin wasn't painful enough, she had hit him exactly where his new tattoo was. Shit, he forgot about that. He had gotten it on Saturday, needing to do something reckless seeing as he wasn't smashing heads anytime soon. He still hadn't figured out if he regretted the permanent ink or not.

Anne noticed it too and she obviously wasn't too charmed by it, "What the hell is that?"

"My new tattoo. You like?"

She took no hesitation in telling him that no, she did not like it. She found it ghastly, and she was looking at the large cross on his upper arm like she would much rather poke her eyes out with her perfect nails, rather than look at it any longer. He guessed it was a tad large.

Just when Brendan thought she had let the issue of seeing his sister go she shoved the mug of tea in his hand and looked at him sternly. He sighed, putting the mug back down and told her, with no uncertain tone, that he was not feeling guilty about anything.

"Last night you said that you couldn't see her because it would remind you that you let her down. That you couldn't protect her no matter how much you tried and now, when you swore you wouldn't let him get away with it, you let her down again because you didn't make yourself a murderer Friday night. "Brendan wanted her to shut up but Anne had a tendency to do what she always wanted. "Then you started blabbering on about how it was _his _entire fault, him and his stupid blue eyes, and stupid laugh. He was the reason you couldn't see her."

Shit. She was making it up. She must've been. But then how would she know about his blue eyes and kill me now laugh.

"I don't know what that meant. You were so out of it by then, I don't think you even knew what you were talking about." Anne sipped at the tea she had picked up for Cheryl, then cringed at the taste of it before draining it down the sink and started to make a new cup of tea. He guessed the first one must've gone cold.

She may not know what he was going on about last night, but Brendan hated the fact that he did. He realised now that he _was_ feeling guilty. It was only partly due to not yet beating Joseph to a pulp, and more to do with the fact that he couldn't bear to face his sister when he kept wondering if the blue eyed boy would call him. If the boy whose brother put his sister in this state remembered their encounter like he did, if the boy would as easily give him the time of day like he was giving the boy if he knew who Brendan was. Brendan knew who the boy was and here he still was, sparing the lad a thought.

Anne finished making the new cup of tea and he took it off her. He was not going to let that family come between him and his sister. He gave Anne a grunt and made his way to Cheryl's room. He walked along the hall as silently as he could, because he sister was like an animal in the wild, one sudden movement and she'd freak the fuck out. Once he was outside her bedroom he leaned his head against her door and breathed in and out a couple of times before finally developing some balls and knocking on the door.

When he heard no movement from indoors, he called out for her, "Chez, it's me. I got you some tea. Open the door for me, yeah." Still nothing. "Chez, talk to me. Why did you lock the door?" He waited outside her room for a couple of more minutes before telling her that he'll leave her tea outside her door for her, then he started to walk away. However, he heard the door creak open, and it made him stop in his tracks.

He still had his back to her when he heard her say, "I thought it was you who wasn't talking to me."

He turned around to face her with a fresh new wave of guilt, because it was true. He was avoiding her, and she had noticed. He smiled at her, and hoped to god it looked like he meant it when he replied, "Chez, I would never avoid you."

She gave him a soft smile, bent down to pick up the tea he had left for her, and then went back into her room, leaving the door open for him to follow her. Brendan braced himself and walked into her room where he found that Cheryl had crawled back in bed. The room was still a mess like it was a couple of days ago when he was last in here, but now there was smell developing, or maybe it had always been here but the break from coming in here had given him a fresh perspective. He opened a window and started clearing up some of the mess in the room while Cheryl sipped at her tea and watched tv. Always watching that god damn tv. At least she was eating now, or drinking, whatever. This was probably the first time that Brendan had seen her consume anything.

"So, the door. Why'd you lock it? Lynsey is downstairs, she came to see you." Brendan chanced a glance at her and saw her shrug in response. He noticed that she was wearing pink pyjamas now, different to the ones he saw her in last time, and he gathered that Elieen must've come over after all and gotten her to shower and change her clothes. Great, another pang of guilt. He wasn't being the best of boyfriends to her and he had rejected any attempt she made to contact him, yet she still helped his sister when she needed it. He was a prick, and she was too good for him.

He grabbed a beanbag chair and placed it beside Cheryl's bed, so he could sit by her, but not too close to her. He still didn't know how comfortable she was with contact. "Chez?" He prompted.

"I just didn't want to talk to her. She keeps asking me the same thing. How am I feeling? Do I want to go downstairs, or go for a walk? Do I want, or need anything?"

"She's just looking out for you?"

"I know, but I feel bad every time I say no and she looks all disappointed." Brendan thought that was fair enough. She had enough emotions to overwhelm her she didn't need guilt added on top of that.

"So, is that why you locked the door?" Brendan asked her shifting, so he didn't sink so much into the bean bag. "To keep her out?"

Cheryl shook her head and looked down at the mug in her hand. She had drunk about half and now she was just holding the thing in her hand. Brendan didn't push her, he waited for her to tell him in her own time.

"I heard a voice last night." That made Brendan sit up in his seat albeit it was difficult to sit in a position where he wasn't slouching. "It wasn't yours or Da's. I got scared, so I locked the door, so they couldn't come in here." Her eyes spilled fear, fear that Brendan had only seen in one other pair of eyes. He hated how that she could feel like that, terrified in her own home, scared of every bump and creak in the night fearing that any little noise was her nightmare coming to life. The feeling that nowhere was safe, not even your own home, your own room. Yes, he had seen that fear before, he'd seen it in himself, and it was killing him knowing that it was now eating away at his sister too.

He swallowed, got up off the bean bag chair, and sat on the bed beside her, he took the mug of tea from her hand and put it down on the bedside table. Brendan stretched his leg out in front of him with his back on the headboard, and a little sense of relief swept through him when Cheryl moved to make room for him, then slid down on the bed and settled her head on his shoulder. It gave Brendan hope that she would return to her old self, slowly, but surely. Two weeks ago she would've flinched if he tried to move a strand of her from her face, but she was getting better. He had to tell himself that. Remind himself that Cheryl was strong, much stronger than him, and she would not let this defeat her.

He kissed her on the forehead, settled his cheek on the top of her head and reassured her that she was safe. "It was only Warren. I got a little drunk last night and he got me home."

"Why did you get drunk? Is it because of me?" Cheryl asked him looking up into his face. He didn't look back down at her, but stared ahead. She wasn't the reason he got drunk last night, but he couldn't exactly tell her why he did.

"No, Chez. Why would you think that?" He was getting awfully good at this. This thing where he spoke to people and said a completely different thing to what was going on in his head. Years of keeping secrets will do that to a person.

"Because maybe you don't believe me after all." This time he looked down at her. He had never once doubted her, and he couldn't believe that she could possibly think otherwise. She could read the confusion in his eyes, "That's why I thought maybe you were avoiding me. I mean why would anyone believe me?"

Brendan felt anger swell in him. Not at her, but at the situation. He hated how she was echoing his thoughts. For years he asked himself why anyone would believe him. If he ever developed the courage to voice his fears, why would anyone trust a single thing that was coming out of his mouth.

Brendan shifted, so he could turn and hold her face in both his hands, make sure she looked in his eyes and saw that he fucking meant what he was about to say. "Chez, I am your brother and I love you. I will believe you no matter what. If Joseph Hay was on the other side of the world and you told me he attacked you from across the fucking Atlantic, I will believe you." Brendan could see tears forming in her eyes, heck he could feel them forming in his own. He didn't smile at her when he asked, "Cheryl Brady, do you understand that?"

She let them go. The tears. She let them cascade down her cheeks as she nodded at Brendan and he pulled her to him, so that her face was buried in his chest and his chin rested on the top of her head. He held her like that. He held her till she was all cried out and he could swallow down the lump that was the size of a tennis ball in his own throat. And when they felt like they could brave the world again did they finally part.

The doorbell went off downstairs and Brendan finally made a move to get up. He picked up the tea mug and headed for the door, but when he got there he turned to give his sister a reassuring smile and told her to come downstairs when, and only when, she was ready. As he was about to close the door behind him he heard her tell him he looked good in those pants and he swore that if he listened carefully she even chuckled a bit.

He made his way down the stairs with every intention to get changed and head to work. Katy may be okay with him ditching work, but he didn't want to mess her about. She was one of the few people that gave Brendan a chance regardless of knowing about his past behaviour in which he's had more than a couple of fights. However his plans didn't look like they'd be going ahead when he saw Anne holding his front door open with a very angry looking Eileen stood outside.

Fuck.

Xxx

Ste got through the morning without incident. He got the odd dirt from across the hallway, whispers when he walked past people, or people abruptly ending their conversation when Ste was near. He knew things would be like this, he didn't expect any less, in fact he expected more. More aggro, people coming up to him and telling him what a monster his brother was, or people throwing boiled eggs at him when he walked past them. Nothing like that happened, instead everyone just acted like he was diseased and stayed as far away from him as much as possible. Or maybe they were scared that he was like his brother. If the best one in the family could sink that low, what awful things was the worst one in the family capable of?

It was only after lunch as Ste, Amy and Rae were walking back into the building did he finally get the confrontation he'd been expecting all morning. The dark headed girl came storming up to him, her face the epitome of anger and resentment, all guns blazing. She shoved him hard on the shoulders and asked him how he dare come in here after what his brother did. She didn't shout at him, it might've been better if she did. She'd have had given him a reason to shout back, but instead she spoke to him calmly, but with every word dripping in unadulterated venom. He thought she was asking him a rhetorical question, but she really expected him to answer.

"Listen… uh…" What the hell was her name? He knew it was something with an L.

"Lynsey." Amy whispered in his ear in a manner she hoped looked like she was just turning her head to see what was behind them.

"Listen Lynsey, there is no reason why I should stay away from here. We've done nothing wrong. My brother has done nothing wrong." Ste was adamant about that. He would keep saying it as long as he had to.

"Is that what you tell yourself to sleep at night." That's what he told himself because it was the truth, that didn't mean he could sleep. There was too much to lose to be able to sleep. "How does it feel knowing you were in the next room while your brother was attacking a young girl?"

Ste couldn't breathe. He needed to get away from her, but when he turned to walk away she gripped his arm. For someone so small and petite she was viscous in digging her nails into him. "Did you hear her plead no? Hmm? Did you?"

Ste forced his arm out of her vice like grip, and he didn't mean to be so harsh when he said, "No Lynsey, I didn't hear her plead no. Do you know why? Because she was proper gagging for it. I didn't once see her tell him to back off; instead I saw her climb onto his lap and straddle him. Your little friend isn't the victim here. My brother is. My brother is the victim to yet another lie your friend has decided to spread, and because of it our lives are falling apart." He was getting worked up here, and he knew he couldn't physically hit the girl, but she obviously cared about Cheryl Brady, so he hit her where it hurt. "Let me ask you something Lynsey, do you feel bad leaving your friend in my home believing what you believe?"

That did it. The girl's eyes increased in size, telling him that yes, she did feel bad, and she thought about it all the time. A little part of Ste felt guilty, he knew how he sounded, like he was calling Cheryl a slag, but he wasn't. He didn't know her, and a part of him wanted to ask her what was going through her head when she told the police his brother attacked her and let this lie go this far. There was also a tiny, minuscule part of him that wanted to ask her if she was okay. Her family must be more fucked up than his own if she could possibly lie about something like this for attention. He knew her mum died, and he knew her brother was apparently a bit of a psycho, and he'd heard how her dad likes to drink, but surely there must be something else that made her this fucked up. Something that had nothing to do with his brother. Surely.

Lynsey wasn't done with him yet, and he began to zone out to her whinging voice, but his friends seemed to have different ideas. He stood in the middle of what now was a crowd as Amy and Rae started a slagging match with Lynsey and Nancy while everyone else stared at them probably hoping for a fight. He didn't realise Nancy was there; she wrote for the college newspaper and he had no doubt that this little encounter would end up there. He put it down to her as to why so many people knew about what was happening as she was quick to print a pro-Cheryl article in the paper. She wrote all about her vulnerability, and how scared she was terrified of coming out of the house, and how her own body disgusted her, etcetera, etcetera. She somehow conveniently missed out the part where Cheryl told the school she had a boyfriend who was in university. Or the time she said she said that her date to the school dance was going to be Nate Tenbury-Newent, the wealthy boy who had come to visit his gran in Hollyoaks. She didn't even turn up to the dance. She had missed out all the parts that could prove Cheryl Brady was a liar.

For his brother she had written shit like he was from a family of drunks. He was pretty sure he'd heard somewhere that Cheryl's dad made a habit of not leaving the pub till closing time. Nancy also wrote that Joey had a brother who had previously been to prison. Ste had been to fucking youth offenders for stealing a car; he wasn't in some high security prison for being a serial killer, he didn't hammer anyone's' skull in. Nancy was nice enough to not put his name on it, because of course no one would guess that Ste Hay could possibly be the brother of Joey Hay. She didn't mention how Cheryl's brother had a reputation of being scary as fuck. She also wrote how Joey's brother would often come to school, if he ever turned up, in multiple bruises. Ste guessed that was true.

When Ste thought he wouldn't be able to handle the shouting match any longer, and would scream till his mouth poured blood, did Mr Blake, the head teacher finally make an appearance. He demanded everyone get to class right this instant and for Ste to see him at the end of the day. Of course it was going to be Ste that ended up in the principal office and not the girl with the cruel tongue, or the girl who abused the power she got from having a certain access to spreading news like wildfire. No, people like that didn't get into trouble, because people like that didn't have the whole package of a dysfunctional life.

Mr Blake stood there until everyone scattered and headed in whatever direction of their next class. Amy went towards her health and social care class and Rae towards music, but when Ste turned Mr Blake grabbed his arm. People would have to stop doing that, he couldn't hit Lynsey earlier, but if Mr Blake didn't let go of him soon he'd swing for him. Ste looked at the hand clutching his upper arm, then looked at Mr. Blake who didn't let go, instead the man stepped closer to him, into his personal space, and spoke in a tone that wasn't a whisper, but far too low to not come across intimidating.

"You're lucky to be here, Ste. Don't forget that. People asked me to give you a chance and I did. Do. Not. Blow it. I will not think twice about expelling you." He missed out a part they both knew he wanted to say. '_And your kind.' _It meant he would expel Amy and Rae too if he really had to, to save the school from the stigma they could bring. Mr Blake had obviously made his mind up about who he believed, and he'd take any excuse to expel Ste so the school and college didn't have the reputation of having a student that was the brother of the local rapist. Amy and Rae would be out too because he couldn't have anyone here who supported a rapist neither.

Finally he let go of Ste's arm and backed off slightly with a twisted smile on his face, "we'll talk about this at the end of the day." Then he turned and went back to whatever hole he came from.

Ste entered the building now fuming, and he knew it wouldn't take much for him to punch someone in the face. So when he saw John Paul McQueen in the hallway he knew his day had just gotten worse. He was getting some pretentious as fuck book out of his locker while his boyfriend Doug Carter stood next to him and babbled on about something. John Paul was a year older than Ste, and he thought he was the smartest person to grace Hollyoaks sixth form; he wasn't. What he was; was an absolute dick, made sense really seeing as he liked it so much. Doug on the other hand wasn't so bad. He hadn't really spoken to the bloke, but he had often caught the boy's eye from across the hall, or something, and the bloke would always, without fail, smile at him. Doug was American, so he reckoned that's what it was; people in England never smiled at strangers unless they wanted something.

It was Doug who saw him first and he, like every other time, smiled at Ste. A genuine one with blue eyes blazing and everything. He didn't know Doug very well, but at that moment there was a part of him that was grateful that he stayed the same. That this little thing that they did didn't change because of what was happening. However to smile at Ste he had to pause in conversation and that drew John Paul's attention to him. Ste tried to walk past without a fuss, but as he reached the two boys John Paul couldn't resist being a complete shit.

"Hey Ste, how you doing mate?" He was being patronising, but Ste would not, could not allow himself to rise to it. He'd be expelled if he did and Ste, despite claiming to hate education, really didn't want to leave; he liked his course, and he wanted to finish.

"Yeah, mint, great. Thanks mate." Ste fisted his hands and hoped to drain all the tension into them.

"Heard your brother came out on Friday for bail." He was all smiles with a fucking cherry on top.

"What about it?"

"Just making sure. I have five sisters, gotta warn them." He never once dropped that shitting smile.

Ste was going to kill him. He was actually going to rip his fucking, I'm better than you, you and you, head off. His sisters were bloody promiscuous tarts, and anybody who didn't want to catch an STD that the girls had probably gotten from humping a dog, would not go near those fucking McQueen girls. Ste took a step towards John Paul who raised expectant eyebrows like he was daring Ste to hit him. However it was the softly shaking head behind John Paul that stopped Ste ramming his fist into John Paul's face and having him make a human shaped dent into the row of lockers. Doug had his eyes slightly widened, trying to speak to him without words and his head was shaking, pleading with him not to do it. Ste wondered how Doug could possibly date a scrote like John Paul.

Ste took a deep breath, "whatever, McQueen." If he listened really closely he could've heard Doug's sigh of relief. However he didn't have time to stick around for that, he was already late for class and he didn't need to give the teachers anymore incentive to kick him out. He walked away from John Paul and Doug with his fists tucked away in his pocket, making it was out of sight; John Paul didn't need to see the effect he had on him.

He walked into class and everyone stopped what they were doing to turn around and watch him enter the room. These people weren't his friends, but he got along with them enough to enjoy their presence during lesson time, and the idea that what was happening had made them all despise him made him feel a little sick. He held his breath and head up high as he walked further into the class. It wasn't a conventional classroom with chairs and desks. Instead it was a classroom designed for aspiring chefs with multiple counters; pots and pans hanging above each, and a corner of the room divided for their chef whites, and another where they would use knives under supervision. Ste loved this place, and the fear of having to leave it behind because nobody wanted him here was enough to make him choke. He wasn't good at reading and writing, but this, cooking, he was fucking brilliant at.

He was stood by his assigned counter, looking out to the rest of the class when Dom finally spoke. "You're already late Ste, let's not waste any more time gawking. Go put your whites on." He smiled at Ste and that was enough to get everyone back to whatever it was that they were doing.

Ste breathed a sigh of relief and went to put his uniform on. The loyalty the Hutchinson brothers showed him was sometimes too overwhelming. Apart from Joey no one else really gave him the time of day. Tony, the older brother, took him into his restaurant when Ste and his family first moved to Chester, he told Ste he'd give him any shifts going and teach him all his culinary secrets if he swore to go to school and stay out of trouble. If he dropped out Tony would let him go. So Ste did, he went to school as much as he could handle, not very much, but enough to keep Tony sweet, and in return Tony taught him everything he knew. Then after school finished Ste didn't have enough qualifications to do A-levels, he couldn't read well enough to be good at anything, but then Tony told his brother, Dom, to talk to Mr Blake about Ste getting into the Culinary Programme. Normally the students would have to have at least a five A-Cs at GCSE to do the course, but Dom and Tony were there at the office fighting for him, and eventually he got in. He was going to get real qualifications in something he really loved.

Getting kicked out was not an option. He'd disappoint himself, and he'd disappoint Tony and Dom.

The afternoon in class went pretty well. People were a bit too forcefully normal around him, as if they had to tell themselves that he was still Ste, and whatever his brother did he had nothing to do with it. Other than that he enjoyed himself like he always did, and he had a pretty neat lasagne to take home too. Even the meeting with Mr Blake wasn't as irritating as he'd imagined in his head. Mr Blake had told Ste he didn't want another incident like the one at lunch, and how he had zero tolerance when it came to fights blah blah blah, Ste was on the verge on expulsion etcetera etcetera. Maybe he wasn't so irritated because it was so bloody predictable.

The real trouble came when he left school property. He had told Amy and Rae not to wait for him while he was in the head teacher's office because he didn't know how long he was going to be, or how angry. Ste was walking by himself, and was about fifteen feet away from the school when someone grabbed him and pushed him into an alleyway. There were about four guys, all tall, wearing black, and with what looked like tools in their hands. No, not tools. Weapons. There was one, not the one who grabbed him, but another, more bulky one, probably the leader of the group, who stepped forward and punched him right in the eye socket, and it made Ste fall hard onto the ground. Then the guy used two fingers to signal one of his thugs to make Ste sit upright, and Ste found his back smacked roughly against the wall, making him feel like his heart had smashed right into his rib cage. The bigger guy then crouched down to Ste's level and grabbed his face, so he was looking directly at him with his rapidly swelling eye, and he watched as the man gave him a slow smile.

The bloke had blond hair, and when he opened his month to speak his accent was southern, slightly cockney. "You're Steven Hay, right?" Ste didn't answer, these guys already knew. "We got a message for your brother, you know, to help him remember." Ste knew what form this message was going to take. They were going to beat Ste as badly as they could without killing him, or putting him into a coma. They wouldn't go that far, because then the police would inevitably get involved if they did. No, they'd just get pretty damn close and tell Ste to keep his gob shut otherwise they'd finish him off next time, and they'd probably mean it. This time they'd just beat him. Badly.

Ste held his breath for the next swing and he closed his eyes in preparation for it, but when nothing came he opened them again to see the cockney bloke staring at him with an amused smile. He explained that they were waiting for someone before the _fun_ began.

"We'll give him a little longer before we start without him." The guy patted Ste's cheeks twice before standing up and straightening out his clothes. Beating Ste was obviously not enough for these guys; they had to torture him with mental images too. "We're waiting for brother Brady, now that guy's a real psycho."

Xxx

_Danny Calling…._

It was the third time Danny had called Brendan now and he was beginning to worry what the guy wanted, however answering the phone was not an option right now. Eileen was going on and on about something to do with him not spending enough time with her and how she'd understand this under the circumstances, but he seemed to find the time to spend with Anne. He wasn't much paying attention to her, and that seemed to only fuel her wrath. Her arms were flying all over the place to emphasize her point, and her face was going red from frustration. Brendan knew he should either treat Eileen better, or just dump her, but right now dumping her would have her all weepy, and he'd rather deal with her anger than her tears.

"Brendan, are you even listening to me?" She asked, hands on hips.

No. "Yes, Eileen. How can I not be when you're in my face?"

"I'm in your face? Brendan I haven't seen you properly in weeks. I come to your house and you're not here –"

"I hate to point out the obvious, but we're both in my house right now."

"Christ, Brendan. Do you have to be a dick about everything? You know that's not what I mean."

She had turned up at his doorstep earlier with a face like thunder, and with a cold, calm voice, she asked him if she could talk to him privately. Anne and Lynsey made a swift escape, but not before Eileen shot Anne a look that would've had her on the floor if she didn't have it in her to throw one right back. Just for good measure Anne had told him that she'd cover for him with Katy and blew him a goodbye kiss, knowing it'd have Eileen wanting to claw her eyes out. If he wasn't so apprehensive about Eileen's visit he would've laughed.

She demanded to know what Anne was doing here, and when he told her that she had just come to check that he hadn't choked on his vomit from drinking all last night she wanted to know why he had time to stay up drinking when he couldn't even answer her calls. Brendan tried to reason that they worked together and it was inevitable that they would see each other a lot, but the knowledge didn't seem to tame her anger.

"Jesus, Eileen. I don't see your problem." She had now passed on that frustration of hers to Brendan and he was practically shouting at her. "I wasn't exactly fucking her on the living room floor when you came in. I was upstairs with my sister while she was down here with my little sister's best friend. What part of that scenario has me looking like a cheating bastard?"

Eileen didn't say anything. She knew she was being unreasonable here, but her anger wasn't just because of today, her insecurities were not a result of seeing Anne in his home. Her insecurities were a product of the way Brendan treated her rather than how he treated other women. He was honest when he told Eileen that he was not attracted to Anne. Even if she was a beautiful girl, he didn't have the desire to fuck her. However the problem was he didn't have the desire to fuck Eileen either. She wasn't bad in the sack he guessed, but she just didn't get him going and he'd have to spend ages in the bathroom beforehand trying to get himself worked up, get enough blood flowing there to get through it. However recently that all seemed like way too much hard work, so he didn't bother anymore. He'd hoped Eileen would've thought this was because of everything with his sister, and a little part of him felt bad for using that as an excuse to keep Eileen's rage at bay. At first she accepted the excuse, but with him spending less and less time with her and Anne forcing her company on him, she had come to the conclusion that he was more attracted to Anne than he was to her.

Now she stared at him and he knew that she wanted to cry, not so much from sadness, but frustration at how their relationship had turned out.

_Warren Calling…._

He could've ignored the call like he did with Danny's, but he really didn't want to see Eileen cry. He'd end up feeling bad and taking her to bed like she wanted him to, and then he'd feel sick for forcing himself to go through that.

"Look, Eileen I gotta take this call."

She folded her arms across her chest and shrugged in what he thinks she hoped was nonchalant. Her watering eyes made her attempts futile. Instead of staying there, comforting her, and telling her that she really had nothing to worry about, he excused himself and went to his bedroom, leaving her sanding alone in the middle of his living area.

He closed the door behind him, put his back to the door, and finally answered his phone. "Foxy."

"Brady, where the hell are you?" Warren's voice was way too excited for Brendan to be comfortable with. "Danny has called three times already."

"Yeah, I know, it was my phone he was ringing. What does he want? What do _you_ want?" Brendan didn't know why, but he felt slightly nervous by this call. Wasn't Danny in Liverpool? Why was he calling him now?

"Danny got back last night and the boys caught him up with all the latest events. You know, the bail, the party, the plan to bash Joey Hay's face."

"Okay. So what?"

"Well, he's got the Hay boy in his clutches right now. I can't get out of work to join the fun, but he's by the alley way next to Hollyoaks sixth form."

Shit.

Brendan swallowed down the dread that was beginning to form in him, "which Hay boy does he have?"

"Fuck if I know, but you know Danny's style." He did know Danny's style, and it wasn't to go directly after the culprit. "I gotta go, Bob went to get some pieces for this car he's got me working on, and I think he's back. Anyway, enjoy yourself." Then he hung up laughing like all Brendan's Christmases had come at once.

Brendan held the phone to his ears a little longer, not having it in him to put it down yet. He couldn't really believe what was happening. He wanted Danny's help at first, but by Brendan's rules, now Danny had come along and decided he wanted to play the game differently. Danny wanted to do this for Brendan, so Brendan would have to owe him and be in his debt until he came to collect.

Yeah, being in Danny's list of IOUs was not something he wanted, but he wanted Steven hurt even less. That's what Danny did, he used people closest to them to really hurt them, have them live with the guilt. He was going to hurt Steven to make sure that Joseph really knew that he well and truly fucked up. Brendan couldn't even deny that he had exactly the same thoughts, because he did, he did want to hurt Steven to hurt Joseph. Except having Danny be the one doing it made him feel like he was being sucker punched. Danny didn't do things by half measures.

Brendan suddenly swung his door wide open and walked past Eileen, barely aware that she was even still here, grabbed his jacket by the door and stormed out of the house. He ran down the stairs heading towards the college, but Eileen from above with her voice, firm and inviting no argument, asked him where the hell he thinks he's going. He looked up at her, and for a second he didn't know what to say. Where the hell was he going? More to the point, why the hell was he going? He didn't know if it was to save the boy, or watch him fall to the mercy of Danny Houston.

He swore to Eileen he'd see her again today and let his legs take control as they led him to the shit that was about to go down.

He was slightly breathless when he got the college, but Warren had told him they were in an alleyway near the building. Where the fuck was the alleyway? After spinning around, probably looking like a madman, did he spot the narrow passage. He took a shaky breath as he stepped towards it.

Danny was there, leaning on the wall opposite Steven who was on the floor slightly curled in on himself. There were three other guys too, and all armed. What the fuck were they playing at? Steven Hay was a fucking skinny little thing, they didn't need four people, and they fucking sure as hell did not need weapons to hurt the boy.

Danny got his phone out again, dialled a number and put the phone to his ear. Before Brendan couldn't even comprehend what Danny was doing, his own phone buzzed, and Brendan had never been more thankful for having his phone on silent. He hid himself from view, and only peeked into the alley so he could see what Danny was doing, but he didn't dare answer the phone. Eventually the call died out and Danny left him a voice message saying they had waited for him long enough and they were going to start the fun without him.

He breathed a sigh of relief when Danny referred to him as Brady and didn't use his first name, though Brendan felt like he could've punched himself for worrying about the revelation of his identity rather than the boy's safety. He couldn't help but feel that the kid didn't deserve this, and his anxiety for the boy's well being only increased when Danny approached him and he heard the boy whimper.

Brendan looked away as Danny forced Steven to his feet and allowed his fist to make contact with Steven's ribs, making the lad double over. He couldn't look at it, but he couldn't walk away either, so he leaned his back and head against the wall and listened as the boy's whimpers slowly turned to screams.

Brendan couldn't go in there and stop Danny, because then the boy would find out who he was and everything would be ruined. The boy would know he was Cheryl's brother and would run a mile, he wouldn't give Brendan the information he needed to get to Joseph. So what if Danny busted a lip and broke a rib or two? Those things would heal, but what happened to Cheryl wouldn't, and he needed to do this for her. This is what he wanted right, a sibling for a sibling? He needed to get Joseph Hay even if that meant allowing the innocent kid to become a bit of collateral damage.

Innocent. He wasn't innocent. Brendan had to believe that. He was helping his brother, and he would tell the world that Brendan's sister was a liar. He was against Brendan even if he didn't know it, so maybe the kid did deserve this after all. He didn't stop his brother the night it happened, and he was standing by Joseph Hay.

Brendan had to stand by Cheryl.

He had to believe that. He had to believe that this kid was a means to an end.

Brendan closed his eyes and started banging his head against the concrete wall. Not hard enough to cause him any real damage. Just an adequate amount to make the pain overwhelm him enough to block out the sounds the boy was making, because now he was full on screaming, and Brendan wanted to help him more than _anything_.

That scared him a little. That his desire to save the kid was slowly edging away his desire to get back at Joseph.

He couldn't let that happen.

Finally he opened his eyes, swallowed and turned. He turned away from the alley and walked away until he couldn't hear the screams anymore, all the while he prayed to god somebody else would. His pace eventually became a run, and his body started shaking, his legs were beginning to give in, but he didn't stop running. Not even when his mouth filled with the acidic taste of vomit.


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6**

Brendan slipped his tongue into the other mouth turning the kiss carnal, desperate and creating a hot assault that sent a shiver through the other body. He could feel goosebumps beneath his fingertips as he held the feverishly hot frame close to him by the nape of the neck. There were nails that scraped at the back of his head making his scalp sting, but he didn't pull away, he pulled closer until their bodies were almost melded together. Slowly a hand reached for the edge of his sweater and he only pulled apart to get rid of all their clothing from the top half of their bodies. Without any barriers Brendan could feel the hardness of nipples pressing into his chest, and he used his thumb and index figure to gently play with one, eliciting gasp from the other mouth into his own. He lifted the small form and legs were instantaneously wrapped around his waist as he put the body down on the bed and pulled both their pants off.

He could do this. He had to do this.

Xxx

Ste woke up and saw nothing but white, and at first he thought maybe he was wrong and those guys had killed him after all. Maybe this was heaven, except Terry's voice from somewhere in the room told him that if he was dead, then this was definitely hell. He was saying something about enough police attention and how they didn't need people saying even worse things about them. If Ste had enough energy he'd have probably snorted at Terry's remarks. All the stigma their family had, had branched from him. Ste Hay was a trouble maker because he had Terry Hay as a role model. Pauline Hay was a drunk because she had a husband that constantly cheated, but made her feel like it was her fault. Joey Hay was a rapist because his father taught him that anyone weaker than he was, was someone to abuse, to toy with, to control.

People were probably right in regards to him and his mother.

Eventually Ste's vision cleared enough for him to realize he was looking up at the ceiling of a hospital, and the smell of disinfectant made his nostrils burn. There was a light weight on his shoulder, a hand, and he tried to slowly turn his head to look at who it was, but the miniscule effort made him feel like his head was a jar of nails. Even the slightest movement created the sensation of countless spikes smacking against his skull and stabbing at the nerves behind his eyes. He made groaning sound to get attention to his now conscious state, giving up any attempt at moving. The hand from his shoulder disappeared and Joey's head came into view and hovered above his own, hiding the two white ceiling that made his head ache.

Ste couldn't help but feel the punch of disappointment when he realised that it was Joey who had his hand on him comfortingly and not his mother. Ste had thought he gave up any expectations of being on the receiving end of Pauline's maternal ways, but the beating made him hope that the fear of losing him might've conjured some long forgotten feelings towards her son. It didn't.

Instead he heard her screech, "Ah, sleeping beauty awakes, does he?"

The sound was like cats being stabbed in the throat by a biro. It didn't draw blood, but it hurt like hell.

Joey rolled his eyes at the sound, obviously not as affected by it as Ste and brought a plastic cup of water close to Ste's mouth. When Ste couldn't lift his head high enough, Joey popped a straw in there, and finally Ste was able to relive some of the anguish he was in. The water slid down his throat and made him think of those Gaviscon adverts where the fireman made of the medicine would slip slide inside the person who drank it relieving them of the burning sensation they felt. That's how the water caressed his throat; he could literally feel the liquid making its way through his body. The relief of the water held such stark contrast with the rest of the pain he was in.

"Yeah alright, let me fill it up again. You're sucking on air here." Joey gave him a tired smile as he took the cup away from him to refill it. Ste hadn't even realised he finished the cup. Joey looked back at Pauline and told her to go and get the nurse, tell her that Ste was up, and Pauline abided. Begrudgingly.

Joey tried to sweep Ste's hair away from his head, but it proved slightly more difficult than normal as Ste's blood had matted his strands to his head. Eventually Joey soaked a bit of tissue and used it to wipe his head of the blood whilst trying to avoid any eye contact with Ste. He couldn't look at him in the eye and it was making Ste nervous.

"Joey, are you okay?" Ste mumbled through what felt like a mouthful of stinging little scorpions.

The question made Joey snort, but he didn't answer him as he settled himself down on the visitors chair next Ste's bed. Terry was sitting on the other one next to it, but he was too busy reading a trashy magazine that he probably stole from the waiting room. Ste guessed that he should probably be grateful that he even turned up at the hospital; that both he and even Pauline made an appearance. He should be grateful, but he wasn't. He knew that it was probably Joey that somehow coerced them into being here, probably said something like_, 'what will people think if you go to the bookies while your son lies in hospital?' _Something to that effect.

If you ever wanted to make Terry Hay do anything you had to make him believe that the world was talking about him, bad mouthing him unless he did something that he was obligated to do. He didn't want to be here, but to look like the doting father who actually gave a damn about what happened to his kids he had to be here. Being worried about what people would say about him was the only reason Terry would turn up at a parents evening, or when the principal called to discuss his behaviour. It allowed them to pretend that they were a normal family, a normal family with troubles, but a normal family none the less. When prying eyes disappeared he'd return back to his typical ways like he was doing now. He was here because the doctors and nurses would wonder where Ste's parents were, but if they weren't looking he didn't have to act like he gave a shit. He carried on reading his magazine, and eventually he felt or saw Ste looking at him from the corner of his eye. He glanced up, and when Ste didn't turn his gaze away, he violently closed it and looked at Ste with the same aggression he showed whatever the hell he was reading.

"What the heck do you think you're looking at, you little skid mark?" Terry had asked him, hoping to make Ste look away, but when he didn't he moved to make it look like he was getting up to hit Ste. Joey put an arm on Terry's chest making him settle back down, and only then did Ste turn away to look at the ceiling again.

He didn't know why he was staring at Terry; maybe he thought if he looked hard enough or long enough, he could figure out what it was that went on in the minds of violent people. Perhaps violent behaviour wasn't psychological, but biological instead; it was wired into people's DNA making it impossible for them to change. Or perhaps that was just wishful thinking. Ste wasn't Terry's kid by blood, but sometimes he could feel the urge to punch someone like a smack heads' need for another fix. Joey on the other hand _was_ Joey's kid, but Ste couldn't remember the last time Joey hit anyone. Ste was probably just trying to find a reason why Terry did the things he did to Ste, why those guys who beat him didn't stop no matter how much he pleaded. He should've learnt pleading got you nowhere, it never did with Terry.

Pauline eventually returned with a nurse in tow, and everyone remained silent as the nurse checked Ste over and he answered all her stupid questions. Yes, he remembers his name. Yes, he remembers the date. Yes, he knows how he got here. He'd probably never forgot how he got here.

Ste was told that his left arm was fractured meaning he'd have to wear a cast for about six to eight weeks. This meant he'd miss about two months of college. He'd be fine with that if it were school, but now it'd mean he'd be two months behind everyone else in his cookery course. As if he wasn't already thick enough. He was the best at the practical side of it all, and that's the side he would be missing out on, but seeing as his right arm was fine he'd be okay to do the theory. The part of the course where he had to read and write. Maybe he shouldn't go in at all.

He also had a mild concussion and four broken ribs, but the rest of his injuries were mainly superficial. He'd have a scar on his forehead, just beneath his hairline where the metal rod had come into contact with it, apparently splitting his head making him need several stitches there. He had a busted lip, both his eyes were swollen and his nose was aching, but it shockingly wasn't broken. Somewhere in his mind, a sick part of him found it hilarious that they'd managed to fuck up his arm, the only part of his body that made him good at anything, but managed to keep his nose intact. Someone up there really hated him.

Terry and Pauline left not long after that, they had stayed as long as they felt necessary, and now that they knew he'd live they couldn't be bothered to stay any longer, not with warm beer waiting for the at home. Joey sat there in silence, his arms crossed, slightly slouched on his seat, and staring at the ground as if it held all of life's answers. He didn't even look up when they were alone and Ste called his name several times, he seemed to be in a world of his own, deep in thought. Ste knew exactly where those thoughts lingered and he didn't need Joey even contemplating such notions.

Ste called out his name louder, almost shouting it that it got the attention of the nurse on the side of the ward.

"Jeez Ste, you don't need to screech, I'm sitting like a meter away from you."

"Yeah, you might as well be in another world. I called your name like a million times."

Joey rolled his eyes at Ste's exaggeration, "I doubt that."

Ste ignored his tendency to take everything literally and asked him, "What were you thinking?

"How I could ask your nurse for her number." Joey lied.

Ste struggled to sit up on the hospital bed, and when a small groan of pain escaped his mouth Joey dropped the arrogant smile and got up off his seat to help Ste up. He tried to make him as comfortable as possible and even fluffed his pillow. Ste would've laughed if his face didn't hurt so much.

"I was thinking about how I'm a really shit brother. I mean, last night I wouldn't let you sleep on the floor because I didn't want you to be put out because of me, and then you end up being battered to a bloody mess."

"Joey, you're so self-centred." Ste tried to lighten the mood with a joke, because right now Joey looked devastated. He looked like he'd go through a lifetime of prison sentences, and people calling him a rapist if it meant Ste wasn't in this hospital bed right now. "Not everything revolves around you. I mean, I made a killer lasagne today, and do you see it anywhere? No, because the beat me for it, and stole it."

Joey gave him a smile to show that he appreciated the joke, but this was serious, and Ste _was_ in hospital because someone really didn't like Joey. Someone wanted to show him that as long as Joey was out and about, the people closest to him were not safe, and that killed him. There weren't a lot of people close to Joey. He had a lot of friends, but most them were people he hung out with, but didn't really think twice about. Ste, on the other hand, was someone that he'd swap any dire situation with, and he'd definitely swap this one.

Ste asked him how he got here in the first place, the hospital that is, not the state he was in. That memory would be burnt into his mind forever; it was a beating worse than anything Terry had ever inflicted on him. Joey said he was at home when he got a message from Ste's phone; it was a picture of him lying on the ground, covered in blood. The message also said that whoever did this to Ste hoped Joey would enjoy the present that was waiting for him in the alleyway by the college. By the time Joey had got there the culprits were gone and Ste's phone was lying beside him. Joey had called the ambulance and tried to get Ste to wake up while he waited for them, but he couldn't do it.

Ste could see in Joey's face, as he told him the sequence of events, that at that moment when he waited with Ste's limp body for the ambulance, he was shit scared that Ste was dead. Joey didn't ever cry, but the reddening of his eyes told Ste that he had today. Ste didn't mention it; he wanted to save his brother some form pride. He knew that Joey felt like their lives were spiralling of control right now, and if Ste asked him if he was crying it'd make him embarrassed. So Ste stayed silent as Joey carried on.

Eventually the ambulance had turned up and assured Joey that Ste was alive and he came into the ambulance with him. He called home and told Terry and Pauline what had happened and told them to come to the hospital. He missed the part where he had to probably spout out all sorts of bullshit to make them turn up. After the Doctors checked Ste over they stayed with him till he woke up. Ste made a joke about how he if he had left Terry would've probably suffocated him in his sleep while Pauline watched on. Joey didn't laugh. He didn't laugh because Ste wasn't far from the truth. Joey didn't believe Terry would suffocate him, but if Joey had left him he knew Terry and Pauline would have too. They would've left Ste vulnerable and accessible to the people who put him in here in the first place. Joey was scared that they'd come back to finish the job.

So he stayed. He stayed with an unconscious Ste and uncooperative parents while every cell in his body was screaming at him to go find the people who were responsible for this.

Ste was about to tell Joey not to do anything stupid when the police approached his bed. One was a woman, the other was a younger guy, and both of them looked like they would much rather be elsewhere. The whole of the Hollyoaks police department knew what Joey was being accused of and they probably knew about Ste's record. Right now they probably thought their time was being wasted, because whoever did this, in their opinion, did a public service.

They asked him questions like whether the assault was provoked. What the actual fuck? He was the one lying in a hospital bed with broken ribs, a broken arm and a fucking a dent in his head, and they were asking him if he invited the attack. Ste told them in no uncertain tone that he was just on his way home when the group of guys dragged him into the alley, and how they told him that he was to be a message to his brother. He didn't look at Joey, but he could feel him seething beside him. Not only because he felt like this was his fault, but also because the police kept trying to manipulate Ste's answers to it seemed like it was _Ste's _fault. They asked him why he was so late leaving college, and when he told them that he had to see the principal they asked him why.

"Because Cheryl Brady's friends were in my face, and of course it was my fault that everyone wanted to see a fight."

"Cheryl Brady?" The woman asked with barely concealed disgust towards Ste. She couldn't believe how he could even dare speak the name. "The girl your brother is accused of raping?"

Joey breathed heavily, and from the corner of his eyes he could see him make a fist. These police officers were getting on Ste's nerves.

"Are you thick or something? You know exactly what is going on here. The Brady's have it in for us, and they sent their cronies after me, hoping to force Joey into making a false confession."

"How do you know the attackers were sent by the Brady's?"

"Because one of them mentioned how they were waiting for Cheryl's brother, except he didn't turn up, so they started without him."

The two officers looked at each other like they didn't believe a word that was coming out of Ste's mouth. They thought that he probably started a fight, but ended up being the one that was hurt and now he was blaming the Brady's to make them look bad. To them it seemed convenient that the Brady boy didn't turn up, because if they went to question him he'd probably have an alibi. They thought Ste needed to make it seem like he sent his thugs to do the dirty work. Eventually they took descriptions of the attackers from Ste and finally left. Ste wasn't going to hold his breath in the hope of hearing anything back.

Joey stood by Ste's bed in silence, but the tension he was emitting made the air between them thick. Ste was aware that it wouldn't take much to make Joey snap now. He'd barely ever used violence in his life, seen the consequences of it far too any times all over Ste to be comfortable with it. But this was different. This time he could've lost the thing he'd spent so long trying to protect.

Ste grabbed Joey's wrist hoping to diffuse the anger building inside of him. He looked him in the eyes imploring and said, "Joey, promise me you won't do anything stupid. Promise you won't go looking for trouble."

Joey turned his gaze towards Ste, and when he spoke, his words were soft, "I can't."

Xxx

Brendan was awoken by something wet on his inner thigh that felt suspiciously like a tongue, it wasn't long before his cock was enveloped by a warm, moist suction. He knew this was supposed to arouse him, but instead he found himself feeling irritated. He had spent most of last night finally giving Eileen what she wanted after weeks of barely touching her, and right now he wanted to sleep. He put a hand on her cheek making her look up, and when she released him to smile he took the opportunity to pull her up. She laid her naked body on Brendan's and kissed him hard on the lips. She slipped her tongue into his mouth, and he couldn't help feeling slightly nauseated by it. Her mouth was sickeningly warm, too wet and too forceful on his, and he had to stop himself from gagging into her mouth.

Her hands started to make their way to his groin, but before she could reach it, he grabbed her hand and clasped his own into hers. The kiss broke and he brought their intertwined fingers to his mouth and placed his lips on them before gently shifting her on the bed beside him. He swung his leg over the side of the bed and sat up, cradling his head in his hands. It wasn't long before he felt a pair of arms snake their way around his chest and Eileen's chin rested on his shoulder. He couldn't remember her being this clingy. He turned to look at her, hoping that she believed the smile on his face when he looked at her, and gave her a chaste kiss on the lips before getting up in search of his clothes.

He wanted to ask her to put some clothes of her own on, but he didn't want to make her feel insecure. It was okay last night when they were in the dark and he had adrenaline on his side, but in the daylight her nakedness made him feel uncomfortable. She looked so small, so fragile, and he wanted to wrap her up with the duvet that lay abandoned around her and put her in the closet where he didn't have to see her. Where he didn't have to be faced with the guilt of having used her last night. She thought she was getting her boyfriend back, but all he needed from her was a distraction. He needed her screams of pleasure to replace the screams of pain he kept hearing.

He knew he was a crap boyfriend, and more to the point, he knew he was a fake boyfriend. He faked all sorts of shit when it came to her. He faked being in love with her. He faked listening to her when she spoke. He faked not receiving her messages, but last night he reached a new low when he faked ecstasy. The first round was genuine; he was desperate and in need of a warm body, any body. She was there and willing, and his own body needed a release, so when he reached orgasm, it was real.

However when she wanted a second round he was more conscious of everything. He was conscious of the stinging that her scratch marks left on his back, the hot breath on his face that made him feel claustrophobic, and the hand on his arse pushing him in further. He tried for what felt like hours to reach that stage of release again, but when the activity became more strenuous than pleasurable, he buried his face in her neck and groaned out a sound that he hoped sounded like ecstasy. She accepted it and bit into his shoulders as she let go of herself. That's how they carried on all night until Brendan had eventually faked sleep.

She had rested her head on his shoulder and fell asleep with an arm wrapped around her stomach. When he was sure that she had definitely drifted off, he allowed his eyes to open and let himself think about how the day had ended up being well and truly fucked up.

He had gone home after he left the boy and found Seamus sitting at the breakfast bar eating like an animal. He had the juice of whatever he was eating dripping down his chin and he used the back of his hand to wipe away the mess. For a while Brendan just stood there, staring at the grotesque scene that played out in front of him. It was Seamus's bark that lifted him out of his trance, and it was Seamus's use of the name Brenda that had him turning around and leaving the house again. He normally hated to leave Cheryl in the house alone with Seamus, but right then he feared that if he didn't leave, his knuckles would've done some serious damage to Seamus's face.

He had walked around for a while, but by the time the sun set he found himself on Eileen's doorstep. He hoped she would open the door and not one of her flatmates who insisted on idle chit chat. He was here for one thing and one thing only, and it was not to discuss the fucking weather. Thankfully it was Eileen on the other side of the door with a scowl on her face. The scowl didn't last long; Brendan was quick to wipe it away with an intense kiss. He went straight in with his tongue and she wrapped her arms around his neck, holding him tight. He lifted her up off the ground and carried her into the flat closing the door behind him with his foot. Her flat was only one floor, so they didn't have to part to climb up any stairs, and once in her room he slammed the door shut and held her against it. He kissed her until he forgot about leaving the kid to his potential death.

Brendan parted from her, looked at her smiling face and found himself questioning what exactly she saw in him. What it was about him that made her smile? He had just a few hours ago walked away from a kid who was getting beaten to, what he prayed, wasn't his death. He was a horrible person; he was a monster. Thankfully she didn't let him think for long though, she pulled him in again, and this time he went for her neck. He flattened his tongue on her beating pulse and let it vibrate through his body; let it make him feel human.

It wasn't long before he had her naked on the bed screaming and moaning.

Now that it was morning, he had a headache and his muscles ached. He wanted to go home and have a bath, but if the expression on Eileen's face was anything to go by she had other plans. She had finally lifted the duvet to cover her chest and asked Brendan, with an expectant face, if he was leaving. He mumbled a reply about how he had to check on Cheryl, and as he bent down, pulling on his boxers, a pillow hit him in the back of the head.

"Jesus, Eileen. What the fuck?"

She stood up, leaving the duvet behind and walked up to Brendan to stand close to him in all her naked glory. If he was feeling uncomfortable before, he could only describe his current feeling as suicidal. It somehow felt wrong for her to be naked while he had boxers on.

"Don't what the fuck, Eileen, me! What you think you can come in here, fuck me, and then leave in the morning like I'm some cheap whore?"

"Eileen, I'm not leaving you. I have to go and see my sister."

"No you don't. She has your dad at home, and you spent the whole weekend avoiding her." When Brendan looked at her with a confused expression as to how she knew this, she explained, "Yeah, I went to see her after you stormed out god knows where, and she told me that yesterday was the first time she saw you since Friday morning." Eileen was fuming, and she finally stepped away from Brendan in search of her own clothes. "So don't give me that crap about her needing you twenty four seven."

Brendan didn't know how to reply to her, so instead he went to put the rest of his own clothes on, and when she demanded an answer, he exploded. "I don't know what you want from me! You want me to fuck you, so I do. All fucking night." That remark earned him another pillow to the face, but he continued anyway, "You want me to see you more, well guess what; it was me who came here. You want me -"

"I want you to look at me and not wish you were somewhere else! Can you tell me you do that? I want you to tell me you love me and bloody well mean it!"

He couldn't.

"Last night I thought we made love, but no. To you it was fucking. You were here with me, but your head was somewhere else." She wasn't shouting anymore, but she wasn't crying either. Her voice was low and certain like this was something she knew for a fact, and no matter how much Brendan denied it, she would know the truth. But she wanted him to deny it.

He didn't.

She let out a mirthless laugh and sat on the edge of the bed with only her bra and underwear on. She had given up putting the rest of her clothes on and rubbed her face like she was tired, tired of arguing, tired of their relationship, and tired of Brendan.

Brendan did care for her and he wanted to reassure her that his affection for her was never a lie. No matter how much bullshit their fucked relationship contained he always felt a warmth towards her. He made his way to hold her, to comfort her, because if he owed her anything it was to remind her that she was someone that deserved to be loved. Maybe Brendan wasn't going to be the person to love her, but she bloody well deserved to know that it was not her fault. It was him that was fucked up, and even she didn't believe it, she helped him in more ways than she'd ever realise. He spent his entire life feeling like a freak, but she let him pretend that he could be normal. When he hated himself, she let him believe that there was something in him someone could love.

They just weren't meant to be.

As he approached her, a phone buzzed somewhere in the room. Eileen didn't even look around before she told him it was his, and how he better get it in case he needed to rush off somewhere like he did yesterday. He couldn't help rolling his eyes at her as he searched for his jacket to retrieve his phone.

It was a text.

From a number he hadn't seen before.

_From: 078********  
__U told me not to txt u wen i rmmbr how awesome u r.  
__So insted I'm txtin u cos I rmmbrd how annoyin u r._

Brendan would've dropped his phone in shock if he wasn't gripping it so hard with disbelief.

"Who is it?" Eileen's voice called out to him, but he couldn't even fake listening now.

The kid was alive. He was okay enough to be texting Brendan, and he was making jokes. Brendan could've choked on the relief he felt; he didn't have the kid's blood on his hand. Eventually he composed himself enough to type out a response.

_To: 078*********  
__I think u got the words awesome n  
__annoyin the wrong way round._

After he pressed sent he saved the boy's number under Steven Hay and shakily put the phone in his jeans pocket. He wanted to be aware when the lad replied. His hands were trembling, and he didn't know if it was just because the boy was alright, or if it was because they boy remembered him.

Eileen was still staring at him when he looked up at her, and he felt obligated to give her an explanation for his attention swaying. He put the rest of his clothes on, then took his sock and shoes to the bed so he could sit by her while he put them on. He tried not to think about the phone in his pocket that wasn't signalling a reply it. Eileen followed his every movement with her eyes, and eventually he turned to give her his full attention.

He cupped her face in both his hands and smiled at her, for the first time in a long time; it was a smile he meant. "Eileen, I do love you and-"

"You're just not in love with me, right?"

Brendan couldn't help but laugh a little, "This is why we can't have a conversation, you never let me finish a sentence."

"But that is the case though." She smiled back at him, and it made her look so young, too young to be tied to someone with as much baggage as Brendan had. She wasn't spiteful or bitter in her comment, she was just a little sad that this was a fact.

"Eileen, I want you to know that I have never cheated on you. I have never even thought of being with another woman while being with you. Out of all the girls I have ever been with, you were the one that I cared about most." He meant it. It wasn't something he was saying to just make her feel better. He truly believed that if he was capable of love, he could've really loved her. She was everything anyone could want in a woman. She was gorgeous. She was smart and independent, knew her own mind.

He guessed he couldn't love her because she didn't truly love him. She loved what she knew of him, but that was the problem. She knew very little.

A tear escaped down her cheeks, falling onto Brendan's hand and he used his thumb to swipe away the streak. These were the tears he was so afraid of shedding, but he should've given her more credit. Or maybe it was respect that he should've given her. He didn't want to see the tears, but he should've respected her enough to let her shed them and eventually let their relationship go. He leaned down and kissed her on lips softly, tasting the saltiness of her tears. It burned him; he wasn't worth anyone's tears.

"Brendan, are we breaking up?" She asked him as he pulled away from her. She wasn't stupid, but they had split up and made up so many times that they never knew where they stood. She was asking if this was really it; the final break up.

Brendan barely moved his head when he nodded, but she understood.

Then his phone buzzed. He was itching to check it straight away, but he didn't want to insult Eileen by prioritising someone else over her yet again. He stroked her cheek once again before he stood up and put his jacket on. As he hugged her one last time, she spoke into the crook of his neck.

"Tell Cheryl I said goodbye." She sounded saddened by the idea of not seeing Cheryl again. They had formed some sort of sisterhood in the time he had dated Eileen.

"You don't have to stop seeing her. She likes you as Eileen, not her brother's girlfriend."

Eileen laughed at that. Asked him what world he was living in. Apparently Cheryl would turn on her faster than lightening if it was Eileen breaking things off here. Cheryl was first and foremost Brendan's sister; them breaking up would probably mean that Cheryl wouldn't find the time of day for her.

"She's a sweet kid, but she loves you a little too much. The end of you and I means the end of any kind of bond I had with her."

He guessed she was right, and it was probably better for them to go cold turkey. If she stayed in contact with Cheryl, they would've definitely bumped into each other, and Eileen didn't need Brendan in her face. He gave her one last goodbye and left her in her room as he finally left her flat and her life.

He pulled out his phone almost instantly, not paying attention to the direction he was going. He couldn't help the flood of disappointment that washed through him when he realised the text was from Danny. Along with the disappointment came anger. This guy shoved his nose in where it had no business being, attacked a kid he had no reason to go near, and then tried to make it all seem like he was doing it out of friendship. Danny didn't do friends. What he had was a long list of people kissing his arse because they owed him something one way or another, and he had been looking for a way to trap Brendan. If Joey confessed to attacking Cheryl because he wanted to protect his brother, then Danny would have Brendan added onto his never ending list of debts to collect.

_From: Danny Houston  
_

_click __here_ _to see attached image._

_Brady, you missed all the fun yesterday.  
__Here's a little souvenir.  
__Don't say I don't do anything for you. Talk soon._

Brendan clicked on the image and regretted it straight away. The picture was of Steven lying on the ground with his left arm in a position that should not have been humanly possible. He was curled into a ball and there was blood coming out of his head, his lips, his arms, his legs, and any part of exposed skin. He was completely covered by the redness of his own blood. Forget being okay enough to be texting Brendan all cheery the next day, how was this kid still alive?

Brendan closed the message and went to check if he had sent a reply to Steven, or if he just thought he had. Actually, what he was checking for was whether he had imagined the boy's message; a cruel trick of the mind that was a result of his guilt. However the message was there. Right on his screen in black and white. Why wasn't Steven replying?

Just as he was about to put his phone back in his pocket, the thing buzzed with life. He just hoped it wasn't Danny.

It wasn't.

_From: Steven Hay  
__I thot I was the 1 givin up my day jo comedian._

He remembered the conversation they had word for word. He remembered all the little remarks Brendan had made. It made Brendan grin, and before he knew it, he was at the foot of the stairs that led up to his flat. He pocketed the phone without replying and went up the stairs. His chest was a million times lighter than it had been the last time he made this trip. He was going to reply, just not yet. The lad made him wait, so he'd do the same. But he would reply.

Xxx

Ste didn't know why he text Brendan in the first place.

He had come home first thing this morning after having convinced Joey to convince Terry to sign the discharge form. Joey would've done it himself, but he wasn't Ste's legal guardian, so they needed either Pauline or Terry. Terry was easier to convince. All Joey had to tell him was that the longer Ste was in hospital, the quicker they'd realise that Ste seemed to have a history in having loads of cracked ribs and bruises all over. In the fear of getting caught as the low life that he was, Terry had dragged his lazy arse to the hospital and signed the bloody papers.

Joey, however, was harder to convince. The older brother was insistent in agreeing with the doctors when they said he should stay for a longer period of time. Let his body rest and heal, but Ste couldn't stand the sight of the place. After spending what seemed like a life time, Joey had finally agreed to take care of him at home. Terry left as fast as he came, leaving Joey and Ste to bus it home, armed with about ten different types of painkillers. Joey made a joke about how Ste better not turn into a prescription drug addict, because nobody had time for such a pretentious addiction. He carried on saying how if Ste wanted to become an addict of anything he'd better start sniffing glue. That's how the entire journey home went. Them just being them. Ste could almost forget that he had broken bones and a busted head. He could forget that Joey still hadn't let go of the idea of revenge.

When they got home Joey demanded Ste go straight to bed... unless he _really _wanted the floor. It made Ste laugh, but laughing hurt his ribs, so instead he coughed until Joey had to hold him upright and led him into the living room instead. Pauline was sitting there nursing a beer; she only looked up once at Ste as he entered the room before she turned her attention back to _Deal Or No Deal. _Joey settled him on the sofa and said something about how there was nothing to eat, so he was going to go out, but he'd be back quick.

Before he left he handed Ste his phone.

He text Amy to tell her he'd live, and told her to tell Rae too, because according to Joey, they were worried sick. It was underneath Amy's name where he found the name Bren, written about four names beneath hers. The name brought an unprovoked smile to his lips that he wasn't even aware he had plastered across his face until Pauline asked him what he was smirking at.

"Nothing, Mum."

"Sure. You're always fucking hiding something." She spoke into her can of beer as she took another sip from it. He wondered if she had the can surgically attached to her hand when he wasn't watching, he couldn't remember a time when she didn't have a beer clasped in her clutches.

He looked back down at his phone, and it was as if his fingers had a life of their own when suddenly he had a text all typed up and sent.

He regretted it. Why did he do that? The older boy probably had forgotten that he even gave his number to Ste.

But he hadn't. Well, the response that came only a few seconds later told him that he hadn't, and yet again a smile larger than life covered Ste's face. He was about to reply when he saw Pauline stand up from the corner of his eye, and by reflex, he locked the phone. She grabbed it from his hand, looked at the blank screen suspiciously and typed random numbers to try and get into the phone. Ste was in too much pain to grab for the phone, so he just waited until she gave up. She did eventually give up, but she didn't return his phone to him. Instead she took it back to her seat with her, and Ste had to wait until she was zoned out enough to risk the pain of getting up and getting the phone out her grip.

When he managed it, he struggled his way up the stairs and got into bed before he replied back to the message. For reasons he couldn't explain he was excited about getting a reply.

It didn't come.

Joey had come home with food, made him some cheese on toast, and sat in the room with him. He spoke to him about how he bumped into Tony who hopes Ste makes a quick recovery, and would like to talk to him about something when he's feeling up to it. Ste didn't have the mind frame to worry about what Tony wanted right now, he was too conscious of the phone by his bedside table that wasn't making any sound.

Joey asked him if he was in pain because he was far too quiet, but before Ste could reply, his phone buzzed.

Ste would've leapt to grab his phone if it didn't hurt so much. Instead he jumped a little on his bed and made a grab for his phone before Joey could. Joey laughed a little, amused by Ste's excitement over a text and told him that if he wasn't already injured, he'd wrestle Ste to find out what kind of filthy messages he was sending Rae. Instead Joey took their dirty plates and told him he'd leave him to his sexting.

Once Joey had left the room he finally opened the text.

_From: Bren  
__I don't need an audience 2 tell me I'm hilarious.  
__Wat I hav is pure class n only a privileged few get  
__to be on the receiving end of my bust-a-gut funny-humour._

_To: Bren  
__U hav a big hed._

_From: Bren  
__That's wat she said._

_From: Bren  
__I'm sorry, that was terrible._

_To: Bren  
__PAHAHAHAHA that's got 2 b ur best joke._

_From: Bren  
__I'll have u know i have had no complaints._

_To: Bren  
__Yeah, not to ur face.  
__They don't want 2 hurt ur feelings.  
__Not after feeling so bad for u anyway._

_From: Bren  
__I have mentioned how hilarious u r, right? Not.  
__Now can we get off the subject of my dick?_

_To: Bren  
__U started it. I'm bored. Wat r u doing?_

_From: Bren  
__Watching crap on TV. Bored too._

_From: Bren  
__Wanna go out for a drnk?  
__U can pay me back for making me drink the piss u served._

Ste put his phone down when Joey came back in with a glass of water and asked him if he wanted or needed anything.

"Yeah, how long do you think till I can go out again?"

"Err... well you have the cast on for about two months."

"The cast on me arm doesn't stop me legs from working."

"Alright, keep your hair on. Why do you wanna go out, anyway? If you need anything, I'll get it for you."

Why did he want to go out? To meet up with the dark haired guy he knew nothing about. Nothing other than the fact that he had blue eyes that looked like they could tell a thousand stories. Hair that made a raven's wing look grey, and a smile that made Ste want to grin too. He didn't know much about the guy, but he did know that he made Ste feel funny, and smart, and someone worth talking to.

He shrugged his shoulders at Joey, and Joey didn't like that as an answer. He started talking about how maybe it wasn't a good idea for Ste to go out by himself until everything was cleared up. Ste couldn't have that, he was not going to stay cooped up in their house with Pauline and fucking Terry. He was probably in more danger in here than he was out there.

Ste's phone buzzed again, but he couldn't check it with Joey staring at him.

Joey eventually sighed and told him he could go out when he was feeling up to it, but certainly not before. He also said he better tell Joey exactly where he was, and he wanted hourly texts telling him he was still alive.

Ste snorted, "Yeah, course. Cos I'm a 13 year old girl, me."

Joey prodded him on his forehead where his scar was, making Ste groan in pain before he left the room again. As soon as the door shut, Ste had his phone out again.

_From: Bren  
__U don't have 2 if u don't wanna. Just a suggestion, but I cross my heart; I'm not an axe murderer._

Ste smiled. Brendan remembered how he'd called him that.

_To: Bren  
__That's exactly wat an axe murderer wud say. I'm up for goin for a drink. Just not 2day._

_From: Bren  
__Of course, sorry._

Ste frowned at his phone. Why was he apologising? He didn't know that Ste couldn't make it because he could barely stand up straight.

_To: Bren  
__Y r u apologisin? I just can't make it 2day, but anothr day..._

Then before Ste was aware of what he was typing he sent,

_To: Bren  
__2mrw? 8pm? River just outside HO village?_

His phone went far too silent for his liking. Maybe the dark haired boy was taking the piss and Ste had taken him seriously. Maybe he didn't want to hang out after all.

Ste put the phone back on his bedside table and grabbed the glass of water Joey had left. When his phone buzzed again he nearly choked on the liquid and most of the water flew out of his mouth. He put the glass back and opened the text.

_From: Bren  
__Sounds like a plan._


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7**

"Alright!" Brendan shouted at the noise coming from his front door as he ran down the steps, still dripping wet and with just a towel wrapped around his waist. "Jesus, gimme a sec."

Brendan swung open the door to find an ever grinning Warren on the other side. He wasted no time in knocking his shoulders against Brendan's as he made his way into the flat and slumped himself down on the sofa.

"Come in, Foxy. Please, make yourself comfortable." Brendan didn't shut the door straight away, a part of him hoped if he held it open long enough Warren would get the hint and leave. Or at least, wait to be actually invited in.

"I intend to." Warren lifted his legs onto the coffee table and crossed them at the ankles as he slouched himself down, and he actually got himself all comfy.

Brendan rolled his eyes at the scene in front of him and slammed the door shut before crossing his arms over his naked chest. His chest that would be drying faster if his hair wasn't continuously dripping water onto it.

"Brady," Warren looked at him like he just saw him now for the first time. "You're aware that you're naked and wet, right?" His grin became wider, if that was even possible, and he let a wolf whistle escape from between his lips. "You're a handsome guy, Brady, but I prefer the bodies in my bed to be... a little less hairy."

Brendan's expression showed no amusement when he let out a vociferous, "HA!" The sound echoed around the room, and the distinct noise of something being dropped to the ground from the floor above them, told Brendan that the sound had startled Cheryl.

"Oh Stop it, Foxy, before you give me a hernia from all this...laughing" Brendan told him, absolutely stoic.

He turned on his heel to go put some clothes on, but as he took a step towards his bedroom, the doorbell went off. Brendan let out a groan and looked at Warren, hoping that the idiot would get a hint and open the door while he went to get changed. Warren didn't get the hint. Instead he shrugged his shoulders and put the TV on, making Brendan feel the urge to hurl him right into it. When he did open the door, there stood a young woman in local community support officer uniform, her blonde hair up in a bun, and with a ridiculously large smile on her face. Were community support officers allowed to be this young...or wear this much make up?

"Hiya, Brendan," she chirped as she appreciated the almost naked state of Brendan. Her gaze travelled his body, lingering on his chest for longer than comfortable before meeting her gaze to his. "Did you just get out of the shower?"

"No, Carmel. I had a wet T-shirt competition with Warren here."

She pushed her head in through the doorway to see Warren wagging an eyebrow at her. The sight obviously did nothing to impress her, and she quickly took her head back out with a small gasp.

"Oh...you won, didn't you? He barely has any water on him, and your hair is absolutely dripping." Her smile grew even wider, flirtier.

"Yes, Carmel. I won." Brendan's eyeballs practically pained from the effort of trying not to roll his eyes at her, but that didn't stop Warren from guffawing loudly. Forget how did someone so young become a support officer, how did someone so... simple become a support officer. Brendan sighed, "What can I do for you, Carmel? I thought your meeting with Cheryl's tomorrow."

"Oh, it is." She shifted where she was standing and looked both ways before coming in close into Brendan's space. She lowered her voice before she said, "I'm here to see you." Then she lowered her voice even more, crowded in closer, and he could practically feel her lips on his ears when she whispered, "about Ste Hay."

Brendan's heart dropped.

He hadn't heard from the kid since yesterday. Heck, he didn't even know if they still had plans tonight. He had every intention of being there, but as far as he was aware the boy was completely high on painkillers when he agreed to have a drink with Brendan. As friends. Or as potential friends.

Brendan asked to see the boy for more than the obvious reason of extracting any useful information from him. He was still going to do that, but now he needed to see the boy in the flesh to make sure that he really was okay. Getting a text from the boy was all good and well, but he couldn't get rid of that nagging feeling that he needed to physically see the boy before the feeling that pulled at his gut would finally give it a rest. He needed reality to overtake the image he kept seeing of the boy in his mind's eye. The image that had Steven Hay crippled, by not just his physical state, but crippled by fear too. When the boy suggested that they meet tonight, Brendan had released a breath he didn't even realise he was holding. Steven was well enough to text him, and he was well enough to meet him.

That's all it was. Brendan was needing to see this boy for purely selfish reasons. A) He needed him to get Joseph, and B) he needed to see him to ease his own guilt at leaving, not Steven Hay, but at leaving a defenseless kid to battle four grown, equipped thugs. Brendan needed to see the kid, for himself.

Brendan scratched his eyebrows before stepping back and inviting Carmel inside, "take a seat. Let me just go put some clothes on."

Brendan went into his room, shut the door and sat on the edge of his bed. He cradled his head in his hands, squeezing his eyes shut. What did she want to speak to him about? If he did it? If he was behind it? The boy was attacked two days ago, why was she here to question him now? Do support officers even question people for crimes? What if she wasn't here to question him? She was here to break some news to them. That Steven Hay was attacked two days ago, he had suffered some severe injuries, and as a result, he didn't make it. He thought he was fine, the doctors thought he was fine, but they missed something. Something that cost him his life.

Carmel's role was to be the bearer of bad news. Or good. Matter of perspective.

Brendan steadied his breath, dried himself properly and put on a pair of dark jeans and a black sweater. Brendan just hoped the colour of his outfit didn't coincide with whatever Carmel had to tell him. He observed himself in the mirror for a few minutes to make sure there was no evidence on the outside of his internal freak out. Then he went out to hear what Carmel had to say.

"So, Steven Hay...what about him?" Brendan asked as he made his way to where Carmel was sitting, as far away from Warren as possible. Everyone knew Warren was dodgy; the police could just never catch him for anything. Brendan guessed that made Carmel, an officer of the law, slightly uncomfortable to be in the same room as him.

She looked up at him and smiled, told him that maybe they should talk in private. Brendan wanted this over as quickly as possible, and telling her that he'd probably tell Warren everything anyway, would've been a waste of time. Instead he led her into the kitchen and told her to settle herself on a stool while he made her a cup of tea.

"I don't know if you've heard, but Ste Hay was quite badly beaten up a couple of days ago."

Brendan kept his voice neutral, and with any luck nonchalant, when he said, "Yeah, I heard something like that." He put tea backs into mugs and poured boiling water into them, "is he alive?" He kept his back to Carmel just in case he couldn't control his facial expression when she answered him.

"He should be okay." Carmel's answer was cheery, but there was something about her tone that told him that she either thought it was a shame that he lived, or that Brendan would think it was a shame that he lived. Either way, Brendan hated that tone. "He insisted on going home yesterday from the hospital, so he should be fine." The tone was still there.

Brendan turned around and carried her tea to her; she took it with a grateful quirk to her lips. He settled himself onto the stool next to her with his own tea, but as she sipped on hers, he left his abandoned on the breakfast bar.

"Why are you here, Carmel?"

"Well," she put the mug down and leaned in towards him, closing in on his space again. He knew that the McQueen sisters had a knack for being... sexually active, but this was getting on his nerve. He couldn't breathe with her so close. He didn't back away. Backing away would make it seem like he didn't want her near to him. All men wanted the McQueen girls as near as possible. Apparently some even wanted the brother. She carried on, "I'm not supposed to say anything because the case has been dropped, but I thought you should know."

Wait, what? The case had been dropped?

"The Hay boys are saying you are behind the attack." Carmel had a face like the accusation was the biggest scandal she'd ever heard. As somewhat a police officer, surely she'd heard of his violent tendencies. Or maybe, with recent events she thought the entire Brady family were victims. Victims that could do no wrong.

Brendan chose to neither deny, nor confirm the accusation. Instead he asked, "Why isn't Steven Hay pressing charges?"

"Because that family is full of liars." She expressed the statement as if it was fact. As if it was obvious and everyone knew this. "I heard the officers who were in the case talking about how he probably intentionally got himself into a fight, so he could say it was you. Or people you sent."

"If that was the case, why isn't he pressing charges?" Surly the entire Hollyoaks police force wasn't as dense as Carmel McQueen. He didn't want to get in trouble here, but these were the people handling his sister's case. What if they missed something crucial because their ignorant heads were so far up their own arses?

"Because of course you had nothing to do with it." Her eyes were widened as if the very idea was absurd.

"Of course."

"So if he pressed charges, you would've had an alibi." Except, he wouldn't have. He wouldn't have had an alibi, because he left Eileen and no one would've been able to confirm his whereabouts. "And anyway, he said you weren't there. Just some guys that you had sent."

"Hm, again, why isn't he pressing charges?" Brendan really did want to know. Steven had been beaten to a pulp, why wasn't he even trying to catch these guys?

Maybe it was because Steven was smart enough to realise that if the police did get their hands on Danny, then he wouldn't walk away with a busted lip. He wouldn't walk away.

"Well it's obvious, isn't?" Carmel leaned back, away from Brendan, and took another sip of her tea. "He's lying, so he knows we won't find anything. This way he makes himself and his brother look like victims who just want to get on with their lives, and you and your sister look like monsters going after a _defenseless_ boy on his way home from school."

"Hm."

"Very smart, those boys. Turning it all on you." She was shaking her head and making tutting sounds, but Brendan's attention was no longer on Carmel.

Cheryl was standing at the bottom of the staircase. She had a water glass in one hand, and the other was still holding on to the banister. Judging by the expression on her face, she had heard a sufficient amount of the conversation. Carmel followed Brendan's gaze, and she gave her a cheery hello, but Cheryl continued to stare at Brendan. She stared at him with unblinking eyes, and a face that told him she heard what Carmel had said, but she disagreed with Carmel. She didn't think the Hay boys were setting them up, she _knew_ Brendan had something to do with it.

Behind her, in the living room, Warren had turned around to see what was going on, and his usual smirking face fell when he saw Cheryl. She had finally left her room, but the tension told him that she had walked in on something that she was better off not knowing about.

Oblivious to the atmosphere, Carmel asked, "How are you doing, love?" She got up off her seat and made her way to Cheryl, who was still staring at Brendan. Carmel put a hand to the small of her back and guided her into the kitchen. "It's good to see you out of your room. Progress."

Finally Cheryl broke eye contact from Brendan and turned her head towards her support officer, "I thought my meeting with you was tomorrow."

"It is, but I thought I should give your brother a heads up about something." She winked at Brendan over Cheryl's head, and then turned her attention back to Cheryl. "If you need to talk to me about anything now, I can stay."

Cheryl shook her head and forced a smile on her face. She had plenty to say, and she had plenty bottled up inside of her, but she hadn't said a single thing of any significance to Carmel before, and she wasn't going to start sharing now.

Brendan left Cheryl in the kitchen and walked Carmel to the door. All the while Carmel went on about these people they were trying to catch, people who were selling drugs from club to club without anyone noticing. They went in, made multiple exchanges, and then left as quietly as they came. It wasn't hard for Brendan to act like he was outraged by the crimes. Warren, on the other hand, was biting into a cushion to stop himself laughing out loud.

"I'll see you tomorrow then?" She asked him as she stood on the doorstep wearing a concerned expression. "For when I come to see Cheryl. You'll be here, right? It'll be good for her to have family around during these meetings; your dad should be here too."

Brendan turned his head to look at Cheryl who was still in the kitchen, watching him. No, he probably wouldn't be here, and their father sure as hell wouldn't be.

"Course." Brendan gave a toothy smile and Carmel returned one right back. "Course, we'll all be here."

Satisfied with his response, she finally left with one last wave and a "seeya then."

Brendan ignored his sister's stare burning holes into his skull and sat down next to Warren instead. He asked why he was banging on his door when he should've been at work. Warren didn't reply. Well, he replied, just not with words. Making sure Cheryl couldn't see, Warren pulled put a plastic bag full of little white pills.

Fuck.

He had told Warren to never bring those into his home, and especially not when Cheryl was around. When his sister turned around to fill up her glass of water, he grabbed the pills and shoved them back into Warren's pockets, and then clutched his jacket, pulling him to his feet. He should've kicked Warren out of his house for bringing that shit in here, but if that happened he'd have to talk to his sister. He wouldn't have an excuse for paying no attention to her. So instead he shoved Warren past his sister in the kitchen and into his room.

"Whoa," Warren laughed as he fell through the threshold and straightened his clothes. "First you open the door for me in the nude and dripping wet, then you shove me into your bedroom for some alone time." Warren sat down on the bed and looked up at Brendan with a mocking grin, "is there something you're not telling me?"

Brendan ignored him. "Shut the fuck up. Are you actually retarded, or do you want to get caught?" Warren chuckled like he had no idea what Brendan was talking about. "You brought drugs into my home while there was a cop in here."

Warren laughed out loud and fell onto the bed as if what Brendan had said was the funniest joke he had ever heard. It wound Brendan up, and before he knew what was happening, he had Warren by the collar of his shirt and slammed back onto a wall.

"Hey, hey, hey. It was Carmel McQueen in here, okay. If she saw us selling drugs, and we told her they we were tic tacs, she'd believe us. Well... She'd believe you." Warren tried to reason with him as he folded his hand over Brendan's own, trying to loosen his grip. "Anyway, how was I supposed to know she was going to be here?"

Brendan slammed him against the wall again. He was missing the point. "Whether Carmel was here or not, I don't want my sister around that."

Warren snorted. Brendan looked at him incredulously, he wanted to ask him what that was about, but he didn't have the patience to deal with him. He loosened his hold on him, and eventually he let Warren go, who visibly relaxed in front of him. Warren was a friend of some sort, but if the people Brendan loved were compromised, he became unpredictable. And he would beat the living daylights out of Warren if it meant keeping his extracurricular affairs hidden.

He didn't even like selling drugs. It was just something he started doing to make enough money to move back to Dublin. Enough money to get him through university and out of his father's hold. He wasn't supposed to be doing this anymore, but as he wasn't going university, Warren must have assumed he wanted to carry on. He didn't. But once you were in the game, it was fucking hard to get out.

"Alright, you can unknot your panties." Warren wandered around the room, speaking as he picked items around the room and observed them. "Won't happen again."

He picked up a picture of Eileen and Brendan that Brendan hadn't had a chance to put away yet, and cocked his head to a side, turning the photo frame around, so Brendan could see a grinning Eileen with her arms wrapped around him, he had his hand out as if trying to cover the lens from taking the shot. The picture ad its frame was a gift from Eileen, and she had placed it in his room herself. She had put her mark in a place that was his. Maybe that's why he left the photo there. Removing it meant removing the final trace of her from his life, letting go of the protection she offered him. The protection of pretense. Pretense that he was capable of anything normal.

He grabbed the photo frame from Warren's grip and shoved it in a drawer. Better to accept reality now, rather than fall deeper into denial. He broke up with her. It was the right thing to do.

He just hated change.

Change made his sister a shell of the person she used to be. Change took away his mother. Change took away Maggie. And change didn't come when he needed it.

"What do you want, Warren?"

"You finish work about sevenish, right? Thought we could go to The Loft." He shook the plastic bag at Brendan, telling him that he didn't want to go to the club for a dance, or to pick up a girl. He wanted to go to deal, make some money.

"Warren, are you fucking nuts? The club is practically on my doorstep. I might as well invite all the students to my house, sit in a circle and smoke pot with them." Brendan couldn't believe Warren. He knew the guy didn't give two shits about much of anything, but selling drugs so close to his home could potentially give his address away to all sorts of scum. Someone could overdose on the drugs, and he could put his sister and himself in danger of inviting in a vengeful sibling.

Brendan didn't miss the irony of his train of thoughts. He was worried because it's exactly what he would do. What he was doing.

"That might be quite fun you know, you might loosen up a bit." Warren chucked the bag of drugs at his head, and when he didn't even attempt to catch it, the thing dropped to his feet. Warren sighed at Brendan's lack of enthusiasm and picked the bag up. "Fine, we'll go somewhere else. Are you in?"

Brendan shoved his hands in his pockets and strutted to his chest of drawers. He opened the top one up and pretended to be distracted by tidying his already tidy clothes. "Nah, I have plans." Plans he wasn't sure he was keeping.

"What plans?" Warren was suspicious. If it was anything criminal, he knew he would've been invited along. He knew if Brendan had a new girl, he'd tell him because Brendan always did. Always made a point of showing off his girlfriends.

Brendan debated what to say. Anything he came up with would provoke further questioning from Warren. And maybe he needed an outsiders view on what he was doing.

"Steven Hay." He kept his back to Warren.

"Your plan is Steven Hay?"

"I'm meeting him." He turned around and sat himself down on the other side of the bed, near the head, as far away from Warren as possible. He didn't like Warren on his bed.

Warren nodded his head slowly with a frown on his face, "Sure. Sure...erm, one question." He turned, so he could look at Brendan properly when he asked, "Why the fuck are you meeting rat boy?"

"Rat boy?"

"Yeah, I saw a couple of pictures of him and Joey in his room. Very pointed features."

There were so many things wrong with that sentence. Steven didn't have pointed features. Well... even if he did, it never took anything away from the boy's appearance, in fact it added on, made him look distinct. There wasn't anyone else in the world that looked at all like Steven Hay. But that wasn't the real issue niggling at him.

"You were in Steven's room?" Brendan tried to sound casual."Wh-when?"

"At the party when I was investigating, and you disappeared."

"I didn't disappear. I was talking to him." Talking. Extracting information. He couldn't remember if he got anything useful, but that was the plan.

Warren started laughing, a harsh, loud rumble, "you sly dog. You found out where he was going to be on Monday, didn't you? And -"

"No." He didn't do what Warren thought he did.

"- you told Danny where the kid would be. You weren't there, but you set it up pretty damn well."

Brendan picked up his bedside clock and started playing around with the time, he'd regret it later when he'd run late for something, but he needed to do something with his hands. He needed to keep his instinctive reaction to Steven's attack at bay.

"That wasn't me. I didn't tell Danny anything. I didn't even know he was back, remember?" Brendan put the clock back and picked up his pillow instead. He swung it up in the air, and caught it as it fell back down. He did again. And again.

"Right," Warren was confused. He had every reason to be. Brendan had sworn to get revenge on Joseph, so what was he doing talking to Steven without the intent to harm. Physically. "So...what are you playing at then?

"The kid has only ever had his brother to completely rely on. He didn't even need to tell me that, I could see it in him." Brendan stopped tossing the pillow and threw it to a side as he stood up and made his way to Warren, to stand in front of him as he spoke. He needed to be convincing, he needed someone else to tell him that this was a good idea. That he had his priorities in check. "He has a mate called Amy or some shit, but even she is lost in the whirlwind that is his brother. The kid is desperate, needy for something that is entirely his own. Something he doesn't need to share."

"And you know this how?"

"His brother called him on the night of the party when I was talking to him. Joseph asked him who he was talking to, but the kid kept it short and sweet, told his brother he wouldn't know me." Brendan licked his lip; he was on a roll now. None of what he was saying was pre planned; he was just spilling these words out like it was all in his subconscious, a way to keep him sane when he forgot the reason why he was getting involved with Steven. "He told his brother that, despite my gaining entry to his home by telling him that I was his brother's friend."

Warren's confused face slowly morphed into something more predatory, more cunning. "You're gonna fuck with the kid's head. You're gonna get him to be best buddies with you, spill all Joseph's secrets. Use the kid to find out his weak spots, and hit him where it hurts."

Brendan smirked, "Kind of. Except, I have a nagging feeling that his precious little brother _is_ his weak spot. What would be worse than having _bite size_ develop something of a...bond with the guy who's trying to bring him down? Having his brother question his own loyalty?"

"You're fucking crazy, Brady." He may be calling Brendan insane, but he was the one with the manic smile. "Brilliant. But crazy."

Strangely he didn't want Warren to agree with him. Didn't want Warren's support on this. He wanted Warren to tell him this was a bad idea, a risky idea. That involving the kid was stupid, because the kid wasn't his brother, and it was his brother that was supposed to suffer alone. He wanted Warren to fight him on this. That way, it would make the fight he was having with himself okay. It would make his already arising guilt about the boy…understandable. He should've known better than to expect compassion from Warren.

"Well, that's all good and well, but I need you and those fucking drugs to leave my house now."

Warren didn't stop grinning as he stood up and made his way to the door, but as his hand clasped around the door knob, Brendan remembered something else that was bugging him.

"Warren. Sunday night. Did you put me in bed?"

Warren turned around, looked at Brendan with a bewildered face. It took him a couple of minutes before he caught on as to what Brendan was talking about.

"You mean when you got so drunk with Mitzeee, you could barely stand up straight?" When Brendan nodded he carried on. "No. I left you on the sofa, didn't even take off your jacket for you."

Fuck.

Even if his sister wasn't stuck in her room at that time, the only other person who would have enough strength to drag him to bed was his father. The only person who could've possibly been awake at that time of the night was his father. The only person who carried him to his room, stripped him of his clothes, leaving only his boxers and tucked him into bed was his father.

That was what his father did when he was eight, and that was what his father did now.

"Is there a problem?" Warren must've noticed the slight look of horror on Brendan's face, because he was looking at him with raised eyebrows.

Brendan swallowed, "No... No, just... just so out of it that night." he gave a shallow chuckle to illustrate how it must've been a good night. It wasn't. And the memory, or lack of it, just got that much worse.

"Yeah, remember Mitzeee is mine. You know, when she realises that she fails with men because she's been in love with me." Warren was being extremely self-confident. Anne did fail with men because her heart was already set on someone, but that guy wasn't Warren.

"Yeah, yeah, get out of my house." Brendan pushed Warren out of the way and opened the door for him, so he could leave.

And there he saw her. Sitting quietly waiting for his attention.

Brendan couldn't ignore Cheryl any longer. So as Warren made his way out of his house, giving him a wink and a grin before he shut the door behind him, Brendan sat opposite his sister at the breakfast bar. She had a bowl of untouched cereal in front of her and a glass of orange juice placed near it, untouched. She didn't prepare the brunch because she was hungry; she prepared it because it was something to do. She took the first step out of her room and was being faced with the normalcy of the household. In her head, in her imagination, she probably thought she'd self-combust as she took her first step out of her room. She probably thought the stairs beneath her feet would deteriorate and crumble, and she'd fall. Fall straight into the crater of chaos she'd created in her head. Except none of that happened, and the last thing she expected was for everything to be the same. For the world to continue as it was, when everything inside of her resembled something of an apocalypse.

He should've stayed with her when she came down, he shouldn't have ignored her and blocked her out from him when she needed him. That was his problem though. He was around when everything ran smoothly. He stayed all these years after he turned eighteen when no harm came to her. She was safe. Even with Seamus. She didn't need him like he thought she did. She didn't need him like _she_ thought she did. Even now, he was home when she trapped herself in the safety of her room, and he swore he'd be there when she was ready to get out. Instead he grabbed Warren and barricaded himself away from her. The one time when she really might need him to hold her up, steady her when she wanted to collapse from the colossal impact of reality, he left her alone to make fucking cereal. She needed him to tell her that it was okay that the world didn't stop along with her. She needed him to reassure her that just because world kept spinning, the world hadn't forgotten about her.

But how could he tell her that when he didn't believe that himself? How could he tell her that it was okay that the world around them didn't match the destruction in her head, when all he wanted was for everything around him to crash and burn into dust? For the universe to explode and take him with it.

There wasn't much they could do about it except join in with it as it moved along. That's why she made the cereal. She wasn't hungry. She was moving with the world.

"You promised you weren't going to ever avoid me." Cheryl had an elbow on the counter and her chin was resting on her palm, and she spoke like she was exhausted, like the energy to leave he room took it out of her. "I get the feeling that you are."

Brendan could say that he wanted to get rid of Warren before he spoke to her, he could say that he had shut the door on his sister because he wanted to protect her from the dark side of his life, the real side of his life. But the truth was he wasn't protecting her. He was protecting himself. He was protecting himself from seeing him in her. Because when it really came down to it, he was a coward, and he couldn't be there for her and help her face what happened to her. He couldn't do that, because he hadn't faced up to it himself. He knew what happened to her, God, he couldn't get the picture of her helpless body out of his mind's eye. What he couldn't face was getting the answers to questions that had been running around in his head, screaming at him in shrill cries, clawing at his conscience. The questions like whether he could've stopped what happened to her...what happened to him. Did he let it happen?

"I'm not avoiding you, sis." He wasn't doing so intentionally, his body just reacted before his mind kicked in. "Warren, he just... I don't like Warren in the house. The quicker he spoke to me about what he wanted, the quicker he'd leave." It was true. He didn't like Warren here.

"What were you talking to him about?"

"Why are we talking about him?" Brendan asked, hoping she wouldn't further inquire about Warren fucking Fox, who brought ecstasy into his home. "How come you came out?"

Cheryl sighed. She put her arm down and rested them both on her thighs in front of her. "I heard Carmel's voice and thought maybe I'd gotten the days wrong."

"Not that I'm not pleased you've left your room, but I'm gonna need a little more than that." Brendan grabbed her cereal and had at it. She wasn't going to eat it after all. No reason why good food should go to waste. She let him take it without question. "You've been up in your room for over two weeks, every time Carmel has been here, she went up to see you. And every time she's been there, you've said barely two words to her." Brendan put a spoonful of milky cheerios into his mouth and spoke around the food, making Cheryl cringe at the sight. It made him smile. "You expect me to believe that you came down willingly to see her?"

Cheryl chewed on her bottom lip, and as Brendan reached for her juice, she grabbed it away from him and sipped tentatively at it, like it might be poison.

"I know there's something you're not telling me. Something you did. Something Warren knows about." She wasn't making eye contact with him. She had both hands clasped around her drink glass, and she was staring into it as if, if Brendan dared lie to her, she'd be able to see it in the liquid. "I came out to listen, because I know you're not going to tell me."

Brendan said nothing; instead he stared at a spot on the opposite wall, burning a hole in it as if he were superman. There wasn't any hole; he wasn't burning anything, because he wasn't Superman. He let that dream go a long time ago.

"And what did you learn, Chez?" He wasn't going to deny hiding anything from her, but he sure as hell wasn't about to tell her the details. He had to be careful; she couldn't know that he was going to see Steven Hay tonight. And she couldn't know that he _wanted_ to see Steven Hay tonight.

"You and Warren beat up Joey's brother." She spoke pretty much as soon as Brendan asked her the question, she had the answer prepared, and she was determined that it was the truth, no matter what he'd say now.

Brendan let out a mirthless laugh and stood up, taking the cereal bowl with him as he walked over to the sink. He scrubbed at the bowl with a sponge, and he continued his manic movements even when the bowl was shining. He didn't beat up Ste. What he was doing was worse. He was going to bruise the boy from the inside out. He was going to offer friendship and trust and loyalty, and when Steven found that all he could really rely on was Brendan, Brendan would tear him apart, leave his limbs intact while his soul was in shreds. Then maybe, maybe Joseph would know what it was like to have someone you loved, be so broken. So helpless.

Brendan just hoped his own soul wouldn't make a sudden appearance.

"Did you actually hear anyone say those words?" Brendan placed the bowl on the draining rack, then turned to lean his back against the sink as he observed his sister. He was about to find out if she actually knew he was capable of the things he was capable of.

"Bren, I was raped. I haven't become mentally impaired."

Brendan's left cheek twitched at the word that so freely flew out of her mouth. "Chez, can…can you not?" He crooked his head to a side to click it. "Please."

"Why not, Brendan?" Cheryl looked at him with cold eyes as she questioned him. And he knew, he knew that she could say that word so easily, that she finally left her room, because she wasn't facing reality. She was becoming detached from it. She was aware of what happened, but she was looking at it from an objective point of view. She was putting a glass between herself and everything that had happened; she could see through it, she just couldn't feel it. "It's what happened. Not saying the word isn't gonna change -"

"Okay," Brendan had to interrupt her before she really began to pick at it. "Jesus. Fuck."

"Well?" Cheryl prompted.

"Well, what?!" Brendan snapped. He wasn't meant to. He wasn't meant to make her jump out of her own skin, and he sure as he didn't want to instill fear in her. "I'm...I'm sorry, Chez. What were you asking?"

"Did you beat up Ste Hay?" The name rolled off her tongue as if it didn't start a battle inside of him. A battle between leaving the kid alone and not getting him involved in a war that wasn't his, because, fuck it all, he found the kid funny. But Cheryl used to be funny too, and the other side battling it out was telling him that he was a Brady, and nobody else fucked with them.

"No, Chez. I did not."

"You're lying to me, Brendan. "Her voice had a slightly sing song tone to it, and the sound sent shivers down his spine.

He was lying, just not about this.

Brendan took in a deep breath and walked towards the living area, knowing Cheryl was going to follow him. He slumped himself down on the sofa and she sat on the arm of it, so she could lean over him. Try to intimidate the truth out of him. Less than three weeks ago, he'd have pull her in and suffocated her for such a feeble attempt at trying to come across like she had any power over him. Now he pitied her. This is what he did. Crowd over people. Freak them out.

"Chez, can you please sit on the sofa like a normal human being?" He prayed as he asked this, that she wouldn't retort by saying that she wasn't normal.

She didn't.

She swiftly got up and moved to sit by him, but she sat close, close enough that when she turned her head to face him, he could feel her breath on his cheeks.

"It's okay if you did."

Brendan's head snapped around to face her. Was she really telling him that she was fine with him beating a boy, barely out of his nappies, to a bloody mess?

"Chez." He looked at her disbelievingly, but her face remained emotionless. "He's a seventeen year old boy who was attacked on his way home by four guys thrice his size. They all had weapons, while he had only text books to defend himself with. He -

"He was in the next room while his brother held me down and shoved his cock inside of me."

Brendan jumped up. He didn't want her speaking like that; like she didn't give a damn about anyone else. He didn't want her speaking so crudely about happened. And he didn't want her to make this thing any harder to bear than it already was. This wasn't her. Cheryl Brady loved and mothered everyone. She fell in love over and over again. She didn't give up hope. She forgave. She cared. And she fucking didn't dare to hurt anyone. Not the physical type of hurt that she was condoning Brendan of, and she didn't hurt with words like she was doing now.

"Chez, Jesus Christ. What the fuck is wrong with you?!" He was practically shouting at her, panic rising at the rate his sister was changing.

There it was again. Change. Rearing its ugly head when you least wanted it.

"We both know what's wrong with me. What the fuck is wrong with you?!" She was screaming at him now too. She was up off the sofa and stabbing a finger into Brendan's chest. "You're my brother. All you do is avoid me, and don't fucking lie to me and say you don't." She pressed her finger harder into Brendan's chest, her nails digging into him. "Are you ashamed of me? Is hard man Brendan Brady ashamed of his weakling sister?"

"You're being stupid, Chez." He was trying to walk away from her, but she wasn't going to let that happen. She grabbed his arm forcing him to stay where he was. "Chez, I'm not ashamed of you. I just don't know what I can do for you." He cupped her cheeks in his palms and looked her in her eyes. "I don't know how to deal with this. The only thing I can do is hurt people and -"

"Then hurt them!" She had tears strolling down her face now. She was aware that normally she'd never make such a request, and the old Cheryl detested this version of her. But the old Cheryl had allowed herself to get into this mess, so old Cheryl had to go. "You promised me you would kill Joey. I want you to do that." She took a shaky breath and said, "I want you to kill him in the worst way possible."

She didn't want him to die physically. She wanted him dead inside, so he pleaded to be dead. She wanted Joseph to feel like he had no control, no power. She wanted to ruin Joseph. She didn't care how he did it. She didn't care if it meant taking away something innocent. After all. Joseph Hay took away her innocence.

"Chez, what are -"

"What are the pair of you doing?" The voice came from the doorway at the front where their father stood. His keys were still in the keyhole and he looked at his children with a frown on his face. When neither of the Brady kids spoke up, Seamus shook the key out, walked into the house, and slammed the door shut behind him. He looked at them with a scowl on his face and walked towards them.

Brendan dropped his hand and stepped away from Cheryl, walked a few steps back, putting distance between them. Seamus, whisky in hand approached Cheryl, but he had his eyes were glued on to Brendan as he wrapped his free hand around his daughter. Protectively.

Brendan eyes stung at the sight, and he let out a choked laugh that held no humor. Seamus Brady was protecting his young. The concept was ludicrous. What was worse, Seamus was protecting Cheryl from Brendan. As if she needed protecting from Brendan.

"Well?" Seamus asked when no one answered him.

Cheryl forced a smile on her face, and then turned to look at her Daddy. "I was just asking Brendan if he beat up the younger Hay boy a couple of days ago."

"I didn't," Brendan had to get that across before Seamus's sick mind started wondering. Started wondering about what exactly he did to the kid.

"He seems to know an awful lot about the attack. How many guys there were. Whether weapons were used." Cheryl's attention was back on Brendan, and she was looking at him with expectant raised eyebrows.

Brendan didn't know what to say to that, so he didn't say anything. Cheryl continued to stare him down, and his father looked at him with a curious expression.

It was Seamus who broke the silence. "Ah, he probably sent some of his lackeys to do it" Seamus smiled, a fucking revolting, stomach churning, vomit inducing smile. "Our Brendan here doesn't like to get his pretty little hands dirty…do you?" He mouthed the rest, so Cheryl couldn't hear; he mouthed the part where he called Brendan the infamous name, Brenda.

When you're raised in the pits of hell, you learn to dance with the devil. Brendan danced for as long as he could remember, it meant he survived, he didn't burn. It meant the liquid fire that was his blood, didn't seep through his skin, it didn't melt away his flesh, and it didn't reveal the very thing that had turned him into the creature he was today. That creature that could very well bathe in his father's blood.

Cheryl told their father that it was okay if it wasn't him who hurt Steven Hay, because she trusted Brendan. Brendan was her brother and he would do the right thing, he would bring Joseph Hay down, because he loved Cheryl and Cheryl needed him to do this.

Needed him.

He wasn't assuming anything now. She was outright telling him that this wasn't something she simply wanted. The battle inside of him, fighting to whether leave Steven alone ceased. The side that had to protect the Brady name didn't just win, it annihilated the side that made him want to ditch the kid tonight and leave him be.

"Cheryl, I need you to think about this. This isn't you." He was almost pleading with her. Not for the boy's sake. For her own.

"It's _all _I can think about."

Seamus still had his arm snaked around her, and it made Brendan's skin crawl. He looked at Brendan with a challenge in his eyes. He wanted Brendan to do this too. He was daring Brendan to do this. See if he was man enough.

"Brendan," his sister called, and she gave him a small smile when he looked at her. She walked away from their father and wrapped her arms around his waist, rested her head against his chest. He didn't hold her back. This wasn't his baby sister. She whispered, "please."

When you're raised in the pits of hell, you learn to dance with the devil. But sometimes, you're not raised in it. Sometimes hell was thrust upon you, and Cheryl was dancing.

Brendan lowered his head and kissed her hair before he unwrapped her arms from around him. He told her that he was going to work now and he'd be home late.

He was going to see Steven Hay, and he was going to do the fucking tango.

Xxx

Getting out of the house was a bleeding mission. Joey wanted to know where he was going, who he was going with, what he was going to get up to. Eventually he stormed out of the house, and he would've slammed the door behind him too. Except, it was impossibly hard and painful for him to do so with one arm in a cast and the other pretty bruised up.

He just about managed to purchase a six pack without making a complete fool of himself, but it wasn't his capability of holding items in his arms that were drawing attention. It was the blue and purple and yellow bruises on his face, it was the bust lip and the cut on his head, the way he slightly limped, and it was those little things that kept all eyes on him in the store.

He should've stayed at home. He should've let Joey shield him from the world. But he wanted to be here. He wanted to do something other than stay in bed and have Joey wait on him, hand and foot. He wanted to see those blue eyes again. They did funny things to him. They looked like ice, but they radiated heat, they made his insides melt.

Ste sat on the ground by the edge of the river. The thing flowed through Hollyoaks village, but it was this part of it that he liked best. It was just outside the view from the public, and the river curved around a bend that reminded Ste of how silk would look as it curved around silver. Ste didn't get gushy over nature, and he definitely wouldn't tell people that he had a favorite spot by the river, but this place had something magic about it. Like something momentous should take place here.

Ste brought his phone out of his pocket and looked at the time. It was eight thirty and Brendan still wasn't here. He had been taking the piss after all, hadn't he? He dragged Ste out here, but had no intention of turning up himself. He probably wanted to see if little Ste Hay was stupid enough to fall for it. He told Ste that he didn't think he was thick, but he must've if he knew Ste would fall for this.

Ste began to feel a lump in his throat, and he inwardly told himself to suck it up. Grow some balls. He was a big boy. So what if he fell for a prank? He didn't have to cry about it like a fucking pansy. But he wasn't going home, Joey would read the disappointment in his face and would question him about what happened, and Ste would tell him and feel like a right twit.

He reached for a can of beer and opened it while he grumbled about how if he ever saw Brendan again, he'd give him what for. However, he stopped when he heard a rustling sound from a tree few feet away from him. It wasn't going to be Brendan, Brendan didn't want to hang out, he wanted to make a fool of him. Ste stood up, beer in hand; ready to chuck it at whatever mass murderer that was lurking there.

Except it wasn't a mass murderer. Well, he didn't think the dark haired older boy was a mass murderer.

Brendan swaggered up to him from the tree, his face the picture of frustration, and used one hand to swipe his jeans. "You know, you could've picked a place where I didn't spend half my life looking for you."

Ste couldn't help the grin on his face. "Or you could've text me and asked for a more precise location."

Brendan smiled and raised an eyebrow as he stepped forward and slowly bent down, his face inches from Ste's as he said, "and what? Missed that expression on your face that made you look like you were about to shit a brick?"

Ste expected him to move back as soon as he was done speaking, but Brendan dropped his smile. His eyes glided over Ste's face, took in his bruises and all the other injuries. Ste didn't miss the movement of Brendan's Adam's apple as he swallowed at the disgust that was Ste's state.

Ste shoved him away and Brendan slightly staggered back, not expecting it, "Leave off. I weren't scared."

Brendan laughed at that, but Ste didn't need to be a genius to know that it was forced. That Brendan wanted to ask what happened to him, find out why he looked like he had swallowed a decaying rainbow and the colours were emitting onto his skin.

Thankfully he didn't, "If you say so." Then his eyes travelled to the cast around Ste's left arm, and Brendan's jaws tensed. "I'll tell you what though," His gaze moved to Ste's other hand and he gestured his head towards the beer. "I'm scared that you actually think I'm gonna drink that poison."

Ste grinned, bent down and picked up a can and tossed the thing to Brendan. He caught it with one hand, but as soon as he had a hold of it, he threw the perfectly good beer straight into the river. Ste had to step back, so the splash wouldn't catch him, then he turned to Brendan with a scandalised face.

He stormed up to Brendan and spoke right into his face, "Ey-yar, I paid for that."

Brendan used a single finger - yes, a fucking single finger - to push Ste back, and then used the same one to wipe spit from the edge of his nose. "Hm, okay bite size, settle down."

Bite size? What the fuck?

Then Brendan grabbed the drink in Ste's hand, walked past him, and threw that into the river too. What. Was. He. Playing. At? Apparently his fun wasn't over because he went to where the rest of the six pack lay and chucked it all in, its entirety. Brendan may be bigger than Ste, but Ste wanted to see how he coped with swimming with the fishes. If he liked throwing things into the river so much, Ste was going to throw him right along with them.

Ste marched up to Brendan, but before he could even get his hands on the older boy, Brendan stopped him, "Nuh uh, don't even think about it, bite size."

And when Ste sighed in frustration, the older boy grinned and dug his hand into a carrier bag he was carrying. How did Ste miss that? He pulled out a glass bottle with dark liquid, if there was enough light, Ste could bet his right arm, his good arm, that the liquid was amber.

Even in the limited light they got on this edge of the river, Ste could tell Brendan had a mischievous glint in his eyes. "Tonight, Steven, I'm going to teach you to drink like a man."


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8**

"No, but seriously, you telling me you're only twenty two? You're messing with me. You look like you're reaching thirty." Ste was sitting on the ground by the edge of the river with Brendan lying on the ground in front of him. The older boy had his arms behind his head, and was staring towards the heavens, rolling his eyes at Ste's comments in regards to his age. "Okay, you gotta be at least twenty five."

Brendan laughed low in his chest at Ste's insistence that he was older than he was claiming to be. "No, Steven, I said I was going to be twenty two in November. So actually I'm younger than the age you seem so convinced I'm lying about."

The conversation had started when Ste had enough of Brendan calling him kid or boy, or his new favorite; Bitesize. He rounded on him and nearly bit his head off, when he shouted that he wasn't a kid just because his hair wasn't graying like Brendan's was. Brendan had mocked hurt by Ste's insult and held his hand to his chest. Told Ste how he had some balls coming out with a strange, old man in the dark where nobody could see them. How he could cut Ste into little cubes, put the pieces in a blender and serve him as a burger in the pub he worked at. Ste had retorted by telling him that the only person that could make human meat taste edible would be him, but he'd be too dead to do that.

Brendan had cut off Ste's laughing by asking him if his hair really was graying, because he'd have to pop into a Superdrugs first thing in the morning for hair dye if he was. Ste had told him that he was only joking, but he knew that the boy was waaay older than himself. He had elongated the word 'way', which earned him a raised eyebrow and a shove to the shoulders from Brendan. It didn't hurt much when Brendan had done that, but the slight wincing sound he made had Brendan's face clouding over with guilt. Ste said that it was no big deal, raised his broken arm in the air and laughed about how he'd had worse.

Brendan may have not realised, but Ste was talking less about his latest beating and more about the times he feared for his life at the hands of Terry. A part of him wasn't even talking about the physical pain that he'd been through, and instead he was talking about the pain that came from how his mother had allowed punch after punch. Kick after kick. The mantra that Terry used to spit out; how everyone would be better off without a faggot like him. When Ste had nightmares, it wasn't Terry's face he saw, it was himself drowning and his mother's figure turning away from him while he tried to reach out to her. Terry always hurt him really bad, but it was his mother that made him feel like he was dying.

In comparison to all that, Brendan's shove could've passed as a feather light touch, or even a touch of affection. That's what it was, right? He hadn't been trying to hurt Ste; you don't shove someone playfully if you hated them. When Ste laughed, it had been genuine. And when he told Brendan it was okay that he had hurt him a little by accident, he meant it. Except, by the look on Brendan's face; he didn't believe Ste. That, or he didn't want to believe Ste, he didn't want him to tell him it was okay.

Ste's smile had faltered on his lips a little, when Brendan's eye had shifted to the cast and stayed there for longer than he found comfortable. It wasn't the first time during the night that Brendan had done that, stared at it, not only his cast, but the bruises on his face, or paid acute attention the groans of pain Ste made every time he moved. And every time Ste caught him doing that, he had an expression that Ste didn't know quite how to read. Initially, he had thought of it as disgust, Ste didn't exactly look his best, but as the night went on, the expression looked more and more like shame.

What had Brendan to be ashamed of?

Ste coughed to get Brendan's attention back. The older boy's dark blue eyes shifted back to his face and he smiled a cocky grin, telling Ste he should toughen up. Then he had taken the amber filled bottle that lay between them, unscrewed the top, and drank the whisky like it was water, like it gave him life. Ste didn't miss how his smile dropped, and his face transformed into something more somber before he placed the mouth of the bottle to his lips.

Yep, Ste was definitely drunk. He was seeing things, surely. He didn't know the bloke well enough to read his face. The shame, the misery he saw, they were all part of his alcohol induced imagination.

Ste had taken the whisky from Brendan and watched as his face scrunched up at the burn of the drink sliding down his throat. Before Ste was aware of what he was doing, he was staring at the droplets of liquid that remained on the older boy's lips. He didn't know what the fuck it was that had moved low in his stomach, when Brendan peeked out his pink tongue to swipe the droplets into his mouth. He didn't know what the movement was, but he liked it.

Brendan wasn't paying attention to him, thank fuck. Instead he was staring out into the black river that had his beer cans somewhere in its pits. Ste smiled at how Brendan had insisted earlier that those beers had poison in them and slowly it was going to kill Ste. Ste joked and said how the whisky was bound to give him a liver failure, but Brendan had dismissed him with a wave of his hand. He had opened the bottle and shoved it into Ste's palm and encouraged him to take his first ever sip of whisky. When he did, the liquid felt like it was eroding his mouth and throat, and he had quickly spat it out, making Brendan double over with laughter. Eventually, as conversation started flowing about nothing in particular, Ste had absent mindedly drank some more and found that he didn't mind it so much after all. He wouldn't drink it by himself, but he'd drink it now.

Ste looked away from Brendan and had asked him how old he was before taking a sip of the alcohol, all of a sudden very conscious about the fact that the mouth he was just staring at, was around it only moments ago. When Brendan had told him that he'd be twenty two in November, the alcohol left his body through his nose. He looked at Brendan with disbelief, and Brendan looked at him with disgust, told him how he better not have had put any snot in the bottle.

He called Brendan a liar, and Brendan simply looked up at the dark sky and said, "sure." And here they were now; Ste not believing a word Brendan said, and Brendan not being able to care less whether Ste believed him or not.

"But...but you look..."

Brendan, slowly sitting up, was looking at Ste with an expression of curiosity. "Yes, Steven, I look like what?"

"Well..."He hesitated. He didn't know Brendan well enough to unleash his opinion about his appearance on him. For all he knew, the guy could be really insecure about his image, he didn't look like the type that starved himself, but he could be the type that spent all his time in the gym because he didn't like the way he looked. "You just don't look your age, do you?"

Brendan rolled his eyes and told him to elaborate, to tell him why Ste thought he looked way older than he was.

"Might be the facial hair. All that stubble. Reckon if you had a smooth face, you'd look well young. Me brother is twenty one and you look way older than him. It's probably because he shaves."

Brendan turned his face away from Ste as he began talking about his brother; he picked up a stone from the ground, stood up and skimmed it across the water. With his eyes adjusted to the dark, Ste could see the stone skip about four times before sinking. He wanted to ask Brendan to teach him how to do it, but Brendan must've caught him staring because he asked him if he wanted to try. He had bent down and already picked up a stone, and was passing it to Ste before Ste had even stood up. He took the thing off him while Brendan told him he'd get more skips, the flatter the stone is. He went to stand beside him, and tried to imitate what the older boy did when he threw the stone into the river.

It didn't work.

The stone sank straight away with a splashing sound that was immediately followed by Brendan's chuckles.

"You gotta bend your legs more and swing your arm less. Use your wrist." Brendan picked up another stone for him and passed it over. "Try again."

He didn't. Ste dropped the stone to his feet and sat back down on the ground. "It's no use. I'm right handed; I won't be able to skim them with my left hand." He knew he was pouting, and he would have probably crossed his arms too if he was able to. Complete the sulking child image.

And just like a parent, Brendan sighed and rubbed his eyes. "Yeah, well, I'm left handed. So why don't you stand up, stop being a baby, and I could teach you." When Ste didn't budge, Brendan clutched onto the back of his jacket and hauled him up.

"Er-ya watch it. Who do you think you are, grabbing me like that?"

"I think I'm someone who ain't gonna take your sulking, so pick up a rock and learn how to skim it. If you can do it with your left hand, it'll be easy to do it with your right later, when you take the cast off." Brendan tried to reason, but Ste continued to pout. Brendan's eyes glanced down at his lips, as he continued, "Imagine how the girls would swoon when you teach them the trick." His eyes drifted back up to meet Ste's. "With both hands too. You're an amateur chef, ain't you supposed to be good with those claws?"

Ste snorted at that and picked up a flat stone, "They ain't claws, alright? And fine, teach me."

Brendan smiled in victory as he stood behind Ste and cupped his hand around his. It skipped about twice before dunking in, not nearly as many times as when Brendan did it, but he managed it. Well they did, it was a team effort. He was proud, yet somehow Ste was less aware of his accomplishment, than he was about the fact that Brendan was still standing close behind him, his chest almost touching his back. And the back of Ste's hand was still tucked snug in Brendan's palm. There was that feeling low in Ste's stomach again. He wanted to throw up a little.

"I'm thinking of growing a tache. Whaddya think? Think it'll suit me?" Brendan had broken the silence with the most random of things. Ste turned his head to look Brendan in the face, who up until Ste was eyeing at him, was staring at the spot the stone had sunk. When he saw Ste frowning at him, he grinned, "What? It might be cool."

Ste couldn't even think about the fact that his face was far too close to Brendan's; he was too shocked by the fact that Brendan looked deadly serious about growing a fucking mustache. Brendan wasn't holding on to Ste's hand anymore, so when he turned around, he used it to push Brendan. Hopefully push some sense into him.

"Yeah, you should, that'll make you look younger." Ste walked over to where the bottle was and picked it up to take a large gulp. He had to settle that movement inside his stomach.

"Well they're supposed to be manly, aren't they? I was thinking of the YMCA type. You know, the horseshoe ones."

Ste scrunched up his face in dislike, "why would you want that?"

"Dunno. Guess if I'm being threatening or something, or have a bright idea, I can stroke it all round my mouth." Brendan stroked the area he spoke of to illustrate the concept, probably hoping to make it look appealing to Ste.

"Brendan."

He dropped his hand, "What?"

"Don't." He looked Brendan in the eye to make sure he understood that it was a horrible idea. "Don't get the tache."

Brendan chuckled and grabbed the bottle out of Ste's grip. "We'll see. I like the idea of me sitting behind a desk at a club or something that I owned, and stroking my tache menacingly." Then he drank a large dose of whisky with a grin on his face that was a result of Ste's horrified expression.

"Believe me, Brendan, you're menacing enough."

Brendan brought the bottle down from his mouth, and Ste deliberately kept his eyes on Brendan's. He made sure they didn't wonder a few inches south. What the fuck was going on with him today?

He was drunk. That's definitely what it was.

"If I'm so menacing, and I looked so old, tell me Steven... Why are you here?"

"I could ask you the same question."

Brendan spread his arms out and stood up tall, showing Ste exactly how much bigger he was compared to him. "Bitesize, look at me. What could you, someone who looks like Bambi, do to me -"

"Someone who is an egotistical fucker with a build that is probably compensating for a lack of something else?"

"Whoa!" Brendan guffawed loudly, "You been holding that in?"

Ste smiled, "a little."

"I'm not that built, am I?"

Truth was, he wasn't. He was definitely larger than Ste, only a few inches by height, but his chest was much broader than Ste's, and from what he could feel of them when he shoved him, they were bloody hard. His arms were pretty filled out, but all in all, Brendan only really seemed _really_ big because Ste, whether he liked the word or not, was fucking petite. Brendan had the body most blokes wished they had. He didn't look like any steroid induced fitness addict, he was effortlessly muscular.

Okay, Ste had to stop paying so much detailed attention to the guy's body.

"Course you're not, Bren."

Brendan grumbled and chewed the inside of his bottom lip, giving the impression that he was scrutinising Ste. "What about my age. Do I look thirty?"

No, he didn't. Ste always know that the dark haired boy was older than him, but he knew that he wasn't that much older. A part of him just wanted to get on Brendan's nerves, get a reaction. Ste was shocked by the age, not because he looked so old, but because there was something about him that looked like he had experienced far too much. Too much for a nearly twenty two year old.

"It's the eyes." Ste was looking into them now. He wasn't staring, but he was trying to read them. He didn't know anything about Brendan, and Ste knew that these types of blokes didn't tell you shit. They bottled it up, they keep everything a secret, and eventually those secrets come spilling out through the eyes. Maybe that's why Brendan's eyes were a dark blue, because his secrets were dark too.

"My eyes make me look like I'm thirty?" Brendan scoffed, forcing Ste to break out of his reverie.

Ste laughed and stepped closer to him, "No, your eyes look like they can tell more stories than everyone in Hollyoaks put together. They look like they've seen things that no one your age should see."

Brendan wasn't smiling. In fact he didn't look too happy about Ste's little analysis. If Ste didn't know better, then he'd say Brendan looked scared. But of what?

His eyes were glassy and they looked right through Ste when he said, "that's funny." Ste was about to tell him that he wasn't trying to be, and if Brendan really did find it funny, it'd be nice if he told his face that. But then Brendan continued, "I thought the exact same about you." His eyes focused on Ste's, and he felt a shiver going down his spine. "Steven, how did you get your bruises?"

Ste wasn't expecting that.

Brendan had avoided asking him anything about the state he was in, and Ste preferred it like that. Preferred to forget, even for a moment, that he had a completely fucked up life. He guessed Brendan couldn't ignore it any longer, but he wished the older boy hadn't brought it up.

"Walked into a door." He lied. It was an obvious lie. There was no way a door could possibly do the damage that had been done to him. He didn't see the point in coming up with a believable story, because something told him that Brendan would know he was lying.

"Right. I guess next you're gonna say, I should see the state of the door. Tell me Steven, did you give the it good few splinters? Really watch it bleed?" He was being sarcastic, and there wasn't a trace of any humour on his face. This sarcasm wasn't a result of him wanting to tease Ste, he was angry. And Ste couldn't tell where that anger was coming from, or who it was directed at, because right now it looked a lot like self-loathing. He should know, Ste had a lot of experience with that feeling.

"Do you want to do something real stupid?" Ste tried to change the subject, and when Brendan sighed and looked down at the ground, he was relieved that he had been allowed to. "I mean, I think we have enough alcohol in us to excuse the fact that we could get into a lot of trouble for this."

Brendan looked up, "Oh yeah, what was your excuse, when you left the house all battered and bruised to meet a guy you'd only met a couple of times before?" He had his eyebrows raised and a ghost of a smile playing on his lips. "Who you have already accused of being an axe murderer, and someone you thought was thirty years old? I mean, c'mon, that's pretty stupid."

Ste tutted and waved away the question with his hand, as if he could bat it away. "This is less life threatening stupid and more, we could get arrested and I could get expelled kind of stupid."

"Okay…" Brendan frowned a little, "you have me intrigued. What do you wanna do?"

Xxx

Twenty minutes later Ste was standing outside the gates of Hollyoaks sixth form with a sceptic looking Brendan. Ste hadn't told him what he wanted to do, he just told the older boy to follow him, and Brendan had no choice but to do so as he, whisky in hand, ran off leaving a bewildered Brendan. He had continuously questioned where they were going, but Ste had simply told him to wait and see. When they finally got to the building neither said a word. He smiled broadly, and Brendan just looked at him like he was bat shit crazy.

"What are we gonna do, Steven, learn some long divisions?" Brendan quipped, when Ste made no move to tell him what they were doing on the school grounds.

"No, you idiot. I'm no good at skimming stones, but I'm pretty good at something else."

"And that would be committing felonies?"

Ste grinned, but other than that, he completely ignored Brendan and asked for a leg up, so he could climb the wall and get over. Brendan rolled his eyes and obliged, but even with the help, climbing over the wall was harder than when he had done it in the past. He had only one arm and his ribs ached when he tried to reach up. Eventually, Brendan had taken pity on him and told him to stop, so he could try. Ste grumbled a little, he had no choice but to give in. A lost battle was a lost battle.

When Ste was back safe on the ground and straightening out his clothes, he turned to face Brendan to ask him how he planned to get over, seeing as Ste couldn't offer to help with his useless right arm. But when he spun around, Brendan wasn't there. Ste panicked a little because he couldn't see him, and he didn't want to be here alone. With Brendan next to him, he could forget that it wasn't too far from here where he was battered, but by himself, the memory and the fear he felt came rushing back. Came fast pummeling into his chest, making his heart rattle hard against his broken ribs. He could've choked from the feeling if Brendan hadn't reappeared again, dustbin in tow.

Brendan positioned the large bin, which he must've stolen from one of the shops in the area, near the wall and walked back to him. Ste's earlier fear obviously wasn't yet vanished from his face, because Brendan was looking at him with a frown on his face.

"What's the matter? I only left you for a minute." His voice was all worry and concern, and bugged Ste.

Ste snapped, "well you could've said you were going, instead of just disappearing." His voice had that aggressive streak to it, which occurred when he was in a situation he couldn't understand; to the point it frustrated him.

It was like when he was in school and couldn't get the words in a book straight in his head, when he couldn't stop them dancing around on the page. Or like when he couldn't figure out a maths problem, no matter how many time he went over it. It felt like a matter he couldn't solve, he couldn't solve why moments ago he was choking on fear and yet now, with Brendan here, he was okay. The fear that the memories brought hadn't completely washed away, but with Brendan standing next to him, he felt like he was safe. Brendan, the boy he barely knew, the boy who dressed and looked like his entire life was one big funeral. He had the type of demeanor that made people feel like, if they breathed too loudly, he'd destroy them with a glare, forget using his hands. Yet, here Ste was, annoyed that Brendan had left him alone, even for a minute and even more annoyed that he made him feel better when he returned.

"Jesus. Fuck. I thought you wanted to get over the wall, you're never going to make it without help."

"Oh yeah, and how's a fucking bin going to help me?" Ste knew he had no right to be getting all pissy with Brendan, Brendan hadn't done anything wrong.

"When you lose the attitude, I'll tell you. Fuck's sake Steven, you're acting like someone was about to -" He didn't finish. He clamped his mouth shut and looked to the ground. And when Ste prompted him to end his sentence, he walked over to the bin instead. "Look, I'll use the bin to climb onto the wall, and then when I'm at the top, I'll pull you up. Once I've jumped down, you can do the same and I'll catch you or something to lessen the impact of your fall, so it doesn't hurt you too much. Okay?"

Ste wasn't going to let it go, he got the gist of what Brendan was telling him about the bin and shit, but he wasn't really paying attention. "What was I acting like, Brendan?

"You're acting like a whiny shit." Brendan didn't even look at him when he said that, he climbed onto the lid of the bin, and then jumped for the top of the wall, before pulling himself up on top. Then he gestured for Ste to move his arse by snapping his finger.

When Ste was on top of the bin, Brendan's hand reached down to pull him up, and when he clasped on, he couldn't help noticing how soft Brendan's hands were, especially for someone with such a hard exterior. Brendan heaved him up with ease and before he knew it, he was straddling the wall just like him. Brendan didn't make a move to jump down and instead he spoke in a voice that, if Ste hadn't seen his lips move, he could've easily thought he imagined it.

"I'm sorry I left you alone without saying anything. That was a dick move."

"You know about my beating, don't you? That's why you're not pestering me to tell you. You've heard the rumours."

Brendan didn't look him in the eye, he looked somewhere past him, and when Ste turned his head around to see what he was looking at, he didn't just assume Brendan knew anymore, he knew that Brendan did. From up here on the wall, you could see the alleyway that he was attacked in, and the sight of the place made his hands tremble. He wasn't the only one. Brendan looked about ready to fall off the wall from the sight of the place; he looked like he could envision everything that had happened to him.

But that was impossible.

If Brendan was there, he would've helped Ste. He's sure of it. Brendan didn't seem the type to walk away from something like that. He wasn't there, because no one had helped him, and Brendan would have.

Ste snapped two fingers in front of Brendan's face to draw back his attention, and when he looked at him again, Ste gave him a reassuring smile. "Hey, you look like you were reliving something there. I was the one that was beat up."

Brendan gave him a bullshit smile in return; it was too tight to even pretend to be genuine. "Just heard that you were pretty badly bruised up by few aseholes out to get your brother. Heard it happened there." He nodded towards the infamous destination.

"Who from?"

"What?"

"Who did you hear it from?" It could've been anyone really; news flew around pretty fast around here.

Brendan offered him a nervous laugh before he spoke, "I work in a pub, Steven. I hear a lot of crap, can't remember who says it all." After that he jumped down, not leaving Ste a chance to respond to it with much of anything. "You coming or what?"

This was going to hurt. He jumped.

Except it didn't. Hurt, that is. Well, not as much as he had anticipated. And the pain he did feel wasn't from the collision he made with the ground. Brendan had lessened his fall when he managed to grab a hold of him before he fell, and the ache he felt was from Brendan's arms that were held tight around his back, squeezing his ribs. Even though his feet were on the ground, Brendan wasn't letting go, and when the pain of his ribs forced a cough out of him, Brendan's face looked worried. He squeezed a little tighter, before letting go completely.

"You alright there, kid?" He rested a hand on Ste's shoulder and bent himself at the knee a little, so he was so the same height as Ste and was looking at him directly in the eyes.

"Yeah, you just held on a little too tight."

Brendan nodded, "Well, you're pretty small; I didn't want you slipping through my arms. The ground would've caused you a lot more damage."

Ste gave him a look of gratitude before telling him to follow him again, and again he was ignoring Brendan's persistent questions about what exactly they were doing. He led them to a door that, to anyone who simply attempted to open it by turning the doorknob, would appear locked. But Ste had spent a lot of time on the other side of that door and he knew it perfectly, he knew that the door would open if you lifted it up slightly and gave it a hard barge. Normally, he would have done it himself, but with all things considering, he instructed Brendan on exactly how to maneuver it to get it to unlock and open.

Brendan managed it on his first go and stumbled into the dark room. Ste pushed him in further and switched on the light, presenting a gleaming training kitchen.

"Shit." Brendan muttered under his breath, and Ste didn't know if it was from worry, or from awe. He hoped it was awe, because this, this was his playground. "Isn't there CCTV in this place?"

Okay, so it was from worry. Worry that they'd get caught.

"Oh come on, Bren, don't tell me you've never broken the rules, risked arrest."

"Yeah, me getting caught is one thing. But you are another."

"Okay, Oldielocks." Ste widened his eyes a little to illustrate that he was not impressed by Brendan's concern. "They don't even look at the CCTV unless there's reason to. We'll leave everything how it was, no one will be any wiser. I've done this before."

"You...you've done this before. Sure. Should've known that.

Ste rolled his eyes. He had done this a few times when he needed to get away from the house, and this place seemed like his only sanctuary. Cooking became something like therapy for him, and it calmed him down when he thought the anger in him would make him combust till he was nothing, but a pool of blood and guts.

He walked in further into the kitchen, taking off his jacket and placing it on a nearby counter, whilst telling Brendan to shut the door behind. The older boy watched on as Ste got out a bowl, a whisk, a pan and other kitchenware. All the while he told Brendan that he wouldn't be able to partake in the cooking side of his course for about two months because of his fucked up arm. How he wanted to make something one last time, and he needed Brendan to be his right hand man. Then Ste lifted up his own cast ridden right arm to hammer home the point that he meant it literally.

"So, what do you want?" Ste asked when he had the cookbook placed in front of him.

Brendan seemed a little more at ease with the idea of breaking into school grounds now, what with food being the main concept of this whole illegal affair. He shrugged out of his own jacket, placed it on a stool and took the book from Ste, flicking through it till he stopped at a page that took his fancy. He flipped the book around so Ste could see, and immediately Ste chucked the whisk at his head. Not the electric one, he didn't want to give him a concussion. Brendan had stopped at the soufflé page; reminding him of the party where they last saw each other. Ste asked if he was for real, if he really wanted a soufflé, because he'd do it. Brendan chuckled that deep laugh he did, low in his chest, and shook his head. Told him he was only messing, what he really wanted was a Crème Brûlée.

"You? You want a Crème Brûlée?"

"What's wrong with that?" Brendan had his face all scrunched up in offence.

"Nothing." Just not a very manly desert.

"I'll have you know, Crème Brûlée is one of the most fucking delicious things you will ever taste." Ste just hummed and nodded away, while Brendan bent down to pick up the whisk that had fallen to the ground after hitting his head. Then, he walked up close to Ste, stood nearly toe to toe with him, their faces only inches apart. "Plus..." he bent his head down closer, so close that Ste could feel the air from Brendan's nose every time he breathed out, "you get to use a blow torch." He patted Ste on the nose with the whisk, then parted from him, buried his face back in the cookbook and started reading the ingredients out loud.

Ste swallowed. That thing in his stomach was at it again. It was making him nauseated.

He asked Brendan to start from the top again, so he could start gathering all the items, and they did that until Ste had everything in front of him. They were both wearing aprons, and Brendan had his hands on his hips looking, no, no, glaring at the cookbook like it was his enemy. Ste had tried to suppress his laugh when he heard him speak to the inanimate object.

"I don't like you, you don't like me. So let's play nice." Brendan's tone was deadly serious, and when Ste couldn't hold in his laughter, he turned to glare at Ste too. It made him laugh harder. Louder. And eventually, Brendan cracked a smile too.

Cooking with Brendan was not an easy task. Ste though he'd probably have an easier job without the Irishmen. Brendan in the kitchen was...aggressive. There was no other way of putting it. He seemed to start a fight with every non-living object in the place, he made way too much mess, and he got frustrated when things didn't go his way. Brendan claimed it was because he was a bad cook, but really, he was just an impatient cook. He wanted it all to be perfect straight away. They got it done though. Eventually. They had the little pots in the oven, and Brendan was dusting off himself like he had just completed successful brain surgery.

Ste laughed at the image, but when he looked around the kitchen, the sound died on his lips. Maybe this was a bad idea after all. With Ste only being able to use one arm, and Brendan who acted like his arms were legs, they had managed to make a whopping mess of the kitchen. There were broken eggshells on the floor, egg yolk all over the tops, sugar sprinkled everywhere. Every ingredient they used, and then some, was making a mess in some corner of the kitchen, not to mention the bowls and everything they used.

Ste sighed, turned his back to the mess and slid down to the floor, leaning his back against the workstation. Brendan joined him a moment later on the floor with his legs bent up at the knee and his arms resting on them. This reminded Ste of when they hung out at Joey's party.

"We not gonna clean up? Surly this mess is gonna raise alarm bells if we leave it." Brendan still had his eye on the oven as if, if he looked away from it, the thing would explode.

"Yeah, just not now. I'm kinda tired."

Brendan chanced a look away from the oven and faced Ste, "Okay."

"Brendan?"

He was back to eyeing the Crème Brûlées. "Yeah?"

"What are you doing here?"

Brendan's head snapped back round, "What do you mean?"

"I mean why are you hanging out with a seventeen year old. Why did you ask to meet me? I thought you were taking the piss, thought you wouldn't turn up."

Ste wasn't accusing him of anything. He was just curious as to what was going on in his head. What he thought Ste had to offer him. Because at the end of the day, Ste didn't have much. He didn't have money for Brendan to be conning him out of that. He didn't have status to increase Brendan's reputation, if anything Ste would only decrease it. Ste wasn't even sure he could offer friendship, nobody wanted to be friends with the boy whose brother was accused of being a rapist.

"If you didn't think I would turn up, why did you?" Brendan asked him quietly. His head was leaning back against the station, and it seemed like he was as curious about Ste, as he was about Brendan.

"I was hoping I was wrong. And I was."

"That you were. I wasn't taking the piss, Steven. But... I very nearly didn't turn up." Brendan offered him a smile to show that he didn't mean it in a spiteful way, or in any way to hurt Ste. And when Ste asked why, Brendan was brutally honest in his answer. "I'm probably gonna bring you down. I'm probably going to destruct your life in a way you never imagined before."

"Then why did you come?"

"Because I like you... Jesus, I sound like an arse bandit." Brendan laughed as he said that, but he wasn't finished. "I'm a selfish person, Steven. I'm probably no good for you, but you're offering me something no one else ever has. And it's kind of refreshing." And when Ste asked him what exactly he was offering, because Ste couldn't think of a single thing, Brendan said, "No judgment." He didn't have much of an expression on his face when he spoke, but his tone had a raw edge to it. It was like he wasn't used to saying so much so openly, and the experience of doing so, was like physically ripping the words out of him and displaying them, all covered up with his insides. Ste had a feeling not many people got to see what was inside Brendan's tough exterior. "I turned up at your house, claiming to know your brother, even though you knew I didn't. But you didn't turn me away. I look like I could be the Hollyoaks' gang master and for all you know, I am, but you invited me into your home and you offered me a drink." Brendan shifted in his seat and faced his entire body towards Ste. "I wanted to meet up with you again, because you offer me a kind of innocence I've never seen before." Brendan smiled, "Even with your attitude problem and your tendency to break into places in the dead of night."

Ste laughed, but not because he found anything Brendan said funny. No, most of that he found overwhelming as fuck. If Brendan was really going to destruct his life the way he claims, he should want to run a mile, he shouldn't want to follow him into that darkness. He shouldn't want to splatter red all over the innocence that Brendan seemed to love so much. He shouldn't be all so willing to let Brendan into his life. Yet, he wanted to know everything about him, he wanted to know what it was that made his eyes so dark, what made him believe that he would bring Ste down, instead of Ste bringing him up.

No, none of what Brendan had said to him was funny, he was laughing because Brendan looked uncomfortable as fuck, and Ste wanted to ease him.

"Well, _my_ reason for coming out with you is not nearly as melodramatic as that." That did it. That made Brendan loosen up and laugh. "You see my brother is the real protective type and all my friends are his friends. He makes sure of that. If he can't be friends with them, then he doesn't approve of them. We've been through a lot together, and he worries about the people I mix with. You say I offer you no judgment... I can't say the same about you." Brendan actually laughed out loud at that, both of them remembering how he wasn't exactly open minded about the Hay household. "But you offer me detachment."

Brendan looked confused, "What do you mean?"

"C'mon, you've heard about my brother. Everyone I know has something to say about it. My friends are his friends remember; they're his army of defenders. And my brother _is_ innocent, but sometimes I just want to forget that there's anything for him to be innocent about."

Ste stared at Brendan's face as he spoke, and he watched as it turned from confusion to something unreadable. Something that was designed to not give anything away. It should've frightened Ste at how quickly he could do that, cover up his emotions, make himself look like a robot, like something void of human instinct. Instead, Ste found himself even more fascinated by him, it made him want to know as much as he could about him.

"Brendan... how comes you're not at Uni or something like that? How comes you work in a pub?"

"Well that was random." He dragged a hand down his face like he was exhausted, he probably was. The fact that Ste's phone had been buzzing in his tracksuit bottom pocket for the past hour, told him that it was far too late.

Ste brought his phone out of his pocket and texted his brother that he's alive and he'd be home soon. "I'm interested"

Brendan sighed deeply, "Something always came up."

He pocketed his phone again and turned his full attention back to Brendan, "What came up when you were eighteen?"

"My stepma fell ill with cancer."

Ste swallowed, he didn't know what to say to that except, "I'm sorry." The topic seemed like one Brendan didn't want to venture, so he avoided it. "What about when you turned nineteen?"

"My stepma passed away from cancer." Brendan shrugged his shoulder when Ste looked at him with sympathetic eyes. He didn't want Ste's pity.

"And when you were twenty?"

"My da became pretty messed up after my Maggie died." Ste assumed Maggie was his stepmum's name. "I mean, he was already pretty fucked, but he started drinking more than usual. I have a baby sister; I couldn't leave her with him."

He had a baby sister. Big ol' Brendan had prevented himself in pursuing a future because he wanted to be there for his family. "Is your sister the reason you stayed this year as well?"

Brendan took a large breath in, "She's a big part of the reason, yeah." He let the breath back out in a shaky release of air, and Ste wanted to ask him what the rest of the reason was. But the oven made a pinging sound, signaling that it was finished with the Crème Brûlées.

Brendan told him to stay sitting while he put on the oven gloves and brought the two pots out of the oven, grinning as wide as his mouth would let him. He placed the them on a tray, then brought them down to where Ste was sitting, blow torch in hand. They could've sat on the stools that were positioned around each station, but sitting on the floor had become their thing.

Brendan used the blowtorch on the Crème Brûlée, and Ste didn't even have to give him any instructions, or tell him to be careful. He used the thing like an expert, and Ste made a joke about Brendan having practiced with one before on someone's eyeballs, instead of denying it, Brendan had turned around and wagged his eyebrows at Ste. Asked him if he was afraid now, and Ste told him no. No, he wasn't afraid, said he wanted Brendan to teach him one day. It made Brendan laugh, and he muttered something about Ste being a bigger sociopath than him as he passed him his desert.

It was pretty good. It was a team effort, and the first time Ste had attempted the recipe. He thought that he could probably do better by himself if he had both hands. Brendan was a Neanderthal in the kitchen, but as Crème Brûlées went, he wasn't complaining. Brendan beside him had scoffed it down in its entirety before Ste had a chance to blink. He offered him the rest of his own because Brendan was eyeing it up, as if he could consume it with his eyes alone if Ste didn't hurry up and shove it down his throat. When he finished Ste's too, he licked his fingers in satisfaction despite not even having a crumb on it.

Ste liked Brendan. Brendan made him laugh.

"So, young Steven. I've offered you a peek into my life; it's your turn to give me one."

"Brendan, you know where I live. I don't even know your surname." Granted, he hadn't actually asked Brendan to tell him.

"So? Do I look like I tell many people much about anything?" No. No he did not. "Count yourself lucky, boy."

Ste sighed. He still hadn't told him his surname. "Whaddya wanna know?"

"You got a girlfriend?"

"Nope. You?"

"I did yesterday morning. Not so much today."

Ste raised an eyebrow and Brendan shook his head. It wasn't up for discussion.

"What about that Amy or that Rae bird you mentioned?"

He remembered. Ste had only mentioned them fleetingly. "Do you remember everything I say?"

"Not really. I store everything people say in my head and little bits of information will sporadically come to the forefront of my mind."

Ste didn't know what _sporadically_ meant, but he got was Brendan was saying. For some reason, he didn't quite believe him. But he let it go, "okay."

"Amy, Rae?"

"No, neither are my girlfriend. Me and Amy used to date, but we're better off as friends. Anyway, I think she has a crush on Joey. And Rae...I don't know. There's potential." Ste didn't have to give out that much information. A simple no would've sufficed. Brendan probably didn't even want that much detail.

The older boy squinted his eyes and made a humming sound that was almost bordering on disapproval. "Why didn't it work out with Amy?"

That was a long story that he wasn't in the mood to get into. "Why did you have a girlfriend yesterday, and not one today?"

Brendan smirked and raised an eyebrow, "touché." Then he stopped smiling, when he asked his next question. It involved Joey. Brendan never smiled when he asked about Joey. "How comes you and your brother look polar opposite?"

"You mean looks wise?"

Brendan nodded, "Yeah, he has green eyes, you have blue. Your hair is a sandy brown, his is almost white blonde. His -"

"Yeah, I get it. We look nothing alike." Ste had to stop that list because it could go on forever. He was right, Joey looked nothing like him. The only thing that made them brothers was the fact that they believed they were brothers. They felt like brothers. They loved each other like brothers. Doesn't matter if it was different blood running through their veins. "Joey is Terry, me stepdad's son. Terry married me mum when she was pregnant with me after me dad ran off. We're step brothers."

"How did you get the bruises?" Brendan asked next, and Ste frowned at him. Brendan knew exactly how he came about this way. He must have read his mind because he said, "I'm not talking about the ones you're covered in today."

He shifted himself closer to Ste and lifted his hand up to place a feather light touch around his left eye. He kept his hand there as he continued speaking in a tone that was almost as soft as his touch, "when I first met you, when I knocked on your front door to gatecrash that party, you had a bruise." Ste could feel Brendan's finger tips moving from under his eyes, to that part in between it and his nose, when Ste closed his eyes at the touch; Brendan moved his finger to Ste's eyelids. Then it was gone, but only for a split second, and only to be replaced by Brendan's thumb, brushing across his lashes. A second later the finger was back, just as light as before, on his eyelid. He moved it right to where he started, just beneath his eye, before removing it completely. "Right there."

Ste fluttered his eyes open and found Brendan startlingly close to him, his icy dark blue eyes penetrating him. Making that thing in his stomach go absolutely crazy.

"Walked into a door." Ste lied. He liked Brendan, he did. But he wasn't about to tell him about Terry. What happened in their home, stayed in their home.

Brendan obviously didn't believe him, and the deep sigh he made before pulling away, told Ste exactly that. "Fine. Next question...and something you won't point blank lie about." Brendan looked Ste up and down. "You sure you're seventeen? When was your birthday?"

"January. I'll be eighteen"

"I know how to count Steven, thank you. I know what comes after seventeen." Brendan could just never not be a dick, it made Ste roll his eyes. "I thought maybe you were a September baby. Turned seventeen only recently. Isn't this your first year in college, how comes you're a year behind?"

"Cos I'm thick, inneh?" He made a face at Brendan that said he was okay with being on the slow side. He had his cooking.

Brendan wasn't okay with him thinking like that though. "You're not thick, Steven. For the love of Christ, stop calling yourself that."

"Not religious, me. The love of Christ doesn't mean much here." Brendan made a face that told Ste he was missing the point. "I'm dyslexic. They didn't spot it quickly enough, when I was a kid, thought I was dumb, so I was kept a year behind. When all me friends went to secondary school, I was still stuck in junior."

Brendan looked at him, not with sympathy, but with what could only be described as pride.

"Why are you looking at me like that?" Ste asked when he couldn't take it no more.

"You said you have dyslexia. Something out of your control. You didn't say you were thick." Brendan's smile made Ste grin too. He made him believe that he was smart; he didn't leave any room for doubt. "So January, eh?"

"Yep, me brother is a September baby though. He turned twenty one, a couple of weeks ago. We had a party."

Brendan wasn't smiling anymore. And just before he let that expressionless face take over again, the one that made Ste want to shake him till his thoughts came spilling out of his ears, Ste saw a ghost of an expression that looked haunted. That looked like he had nightmares about the night Ste was referring to. He wanted to question Brendan about it, but as far as he was aware, he imagined the look. Brendan could've been aware of the rumours of that night, but it didn't explain the face. Unless… No, Ste imagined it.

It was getting late and they still had this place to clean. Brendan was already getting up, using the table top to heave himself up, and he offered a hand to Ste to help him too. The older boy had already started clearing stuff by the time Ste was standing straight, but then he grabbed a small bowl of flour and faced Ste.

"Steven." Ste was gathering all the spoons they used, so he didn't turn around to Brendan's voice, instead he hummed to show he was listening. "Look at me, Steven" And when Ste did, Brendan had an all too mischievous smirk on his face. "I don't want to talk about your brother."

Then he dipped the entire bowl of flour over Ste's head.


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9**

"You seem like you're getting along as fine as could be expected."

Oh for fuck's sake.

If Cheryl was having a panic attack then and there in front of Carmel McQueen, she still wouldn't be aware of what the hell was going on. Cheryl had rings around her eyes, she was snappy in her responses to any question Carmel asked, and she had lathered herself in pure, unadulterated bitterness. She was most certainly not fine, and a person would've had to be as blind as a bleeding bat to have not seen that Cheryl was on the verge of a mental breakdown.

"Yep. I'm great." Cheryl gave Carmel a hollow smile and leaned back on the sofa she was sitting on. She was almost forcing herself to sink as far into the cushions of the sofa as possible, escape this meeting any way she can.

It was Carmel's weekly visits to see how Cheryl was getting along, keeping her updated with what's going on and how the court proceedings will go, whether she was fit to stand up in court. Cheryl never really said much at these meetings, but last week, the day after the night with Steven, she had begun to say more. Nothing of much importance. She never spoke of what happened that night, she never spoke about her feelings in regards to it. She never spoke about Joseph Hay, not to Carmel. Last week when she started speaking, she started speaking about the most mundane fucking things ever. Like if she spoke about the weather, or who she was supporting on X factor, she could pretend like she was just speaking to a friend. Like she hadn't told Brendan to rip apart the Hay boys.

Brendan had sat there that day - Seamus absent, as expected - and wondered what the hell was going on in her head. More to the point, he was wondering what the hell was going on in his. He had spent the night with Steven Hay with the purpose of finding out as much about Joseph as possible, but when the boy started talking about his brother, Brendan didn't want to hear it. He didn't want Joseph to taint the night he had spent with the boy, because despite everything, he had a good time. The best time.

So much so, he spent every night for the past seven nights with the lad.

"What about you, Brendan?" Carmel's voice penetrated through the memory playing in his head of Steven's first, pathetic attempt at skimming stones.

He looked at her with a blank face, he knew she said something to him, but he didn't know what the words that came out of her mouth were.

"Huh?" He asked, because manners seemed have escaped him. Right now, he was to busy trying to shake away the image of Steven's pout from his mind's eye.

"How have you been doing? As I've mentioned before, when something like this happens, it's not just one person that is affected by it, it's people around them too." She had a sympathetic face on her, as if to say that if he needed to speak to someone, she was here. He'd sooner speak to a Tinkerbell doll. When Brendan didn't answer straight away, she said, "I see you've been yawning a lot today. Not sleeping well?"

And before he could respond, Cheryl piped up. "He's been yawning a lot recently. Doesn't come home till the early hours of the morning."

Of course Cheryl noticed. She didn't exactly sleep, and when she did, the smallest creek could wake her up. He had always tried to be as quiet as possible when he came home, and he never lingered too long before going to bed. He'd gone to the toilet one night after a night of heavy drinking with the boy, and he had a shower the first night after Steven had doused him in flour. But other than that, he had always tried to keep his late night liason away from Cheryl's attention.

Mission failed.

"I... I'm not the concern here, am I?" Brendan tried to deflect the spotlight away from him and back to Cheryl. This was her meeting after all. He was just supposed to be here for support.

"It's not really about who the concern is. Cheryl needs her big brother right now, but if you're having any sort of trouble due to recent events, then you should tell someone. We can give you both support, that way you're not putting your needs aside to only appear strong." Carmel seemed proud of her little speech, like she thought it would really get through to Brendan.

"Carmel, I'm fine. Honest. The late nights have nothing to do with _recent events." _Lies. Well half lies. It had started off as everything to do with what had happened, but recently, he just liked the boy's company."I work during the day, so nights are the only time I can go out. It's all innocent" Now that was one hundred percent a lie. Nothing about how he spent his nights during the last week was innocent. If he had punched the boy and demanded information from him, demanded he tell the truth about his brother, or get his brother to tell it, it would've been more innocent than manipulating him. Than befriending him.

Carmel nodded and continued her assessment of Cheryl, then smiled as she stood up and said her goodbyes till next week. These visits would continue until Carmel felt that Cheryl was stable enough to no longer need the support she was offering. But Cheryl never said anything of any impact. These visits would last a long time. Before leaving she said how next time it'd be nice if Seamus could join, seeing as he hadn't turned up to any yet. Seamus wouldn't ever join them, hell, Brendan wouldn't have even been here if Carmel hadn't seen him trying to creep past the living room and up the stairs, to the bathroom. Hence why he was sitting on the sofa in boxers and a tee he had slipped into, when he heard her voice coming through the walls. He should've tried to hold his pee in.

During her first two visits Brendan had opened the door for her, but made a prompt escape by telling her that Cheryl may be more comfortable speaking if they were alone. Cheryl wasn't. Then last week when he let Carmel in, because Seamus wouldn't leave his bed till four in the evening or he'd already left before Carmel's appearance, he stayed for the meeting after bringing Cheryl down. He had felt bad that the night before he had laughed with Steven Hay, and that laughter had been genuine. He hadn't laughed with Cheryl in a long time. He had no intention of appearing at another meeting, yet there he was eating fucking crumpets and tea with a woman who made him feel like frying his brain.

Next time he'd pee in bed.

After Carmel left, Brendan headed into the kitchen to make himself some coffee, seeing as he was having a ridiculously hard time keeping his eyes open and his mouth closed. All this yawning was going to get him in trouble.

Cheryl followed him in close behind, "so are you gonna tell me where you go every night for the past week?"

Too late. He was already in trouble.

He didn't turn to look at her. Instead, he kept making his coffee with his back to her as he spoke, "just hanging out with the lads. Like I said, it's hard to find time to just relax with with them when I work all day."

"It wasn't a problem before," Cheryl pointed out. And she was right. His excuse had numerous holes in it.

He never worked mornings; he normally worked the afternoon shifts until eight or ten. He had all morning to spend with his friends, and after he finished work he had a fair amount of time left. He didn't have to come home, rolling in at four in the morning. Not to mention the fact that most of his friends were in university and they had left for their first semester back, when September arrived. And those who didn't go Uni, those like Warren, had jobs to attend to. They wouldn't be able to make it to work the next morning if they arrived home close to dawn seven nights in a row.

Right now, Brendan's best defense was to be a bastard.

"Chez, climb out of my arse for just a second, will ya?" He still had his back to her, too scared that he'd lose his resolve if he turned around and saw her hurt expression.

"I will." Her tone was determined. She wasn't about to let Brendan's attitude towards her stop her from finding out where he spends his nights. "Once you tell me where it is that you go every night. I would say it's you avoiding me again, but you'd just deny that like you always do."

Brendan swung round to face her, he was getting annoyed now. "For the last fucking time, I am not avoiding you." He walked up close to her and bowed his head down, so she could look directly into his eyes and know that he was telling the truth. He didn't want this discussion of avoiding her again. "Everything I have done in my life, since the day my mother died, has been for you. So I need you to trust me when I tell you that, that isn't changing anytime soon. I'm not avoiding you, Chez. If I was, I would've gone to Dublin. But I didn't. I am here and I'm going to be here as long as you need me."

Cheryl didn't even blink as her gaze pierced into Brendan's. He wasn't going to be the first to look away, he had to hold his ground, he had to make her understand. Understand that the only reason he was still breathing was because he was scared that if he took his own life, if he ceased to exist, Seamus would find someone else's life to ruin. He would take a lifetime of abuse from Seamus if it stopped that _someone else _being Cheryl.

She looked away first. She took a deep breath and walked around Brendan to finish making his coffee for him. When she was done, she placed it in front of him at the breakfast bar and gave him a watery smile. She was apologising, and he gave her a smile in return to say he was sorry too. He _was _sorry, he was sorry for a lot of stuff, but he couldn't help feeling a wave of resentment rising within him. She was the reason he was still alive, but he would've preferred it if he wasn't.

"I just have one question. That thing I made you promise to do last week." Cheryl sat down on a stool and grabbed his hands, held on to it as tight as she could. He was her anchor.

"What about it?" His tone had a hint of hope in it. Hope that his baby sister was back, and that the whole ordeal last week was a moment of madness. A moment she regretted and took back. He was still going to bring Joseph Hay to his knees, even if his latest actions didn't make that quite so clear, he was still going to do that. He just didn't want his sister wanting that too. He didn't want his sister's mind to work the way _his _did.

"You're still keeping that promise, right?" So no. She hadn't changed her mind." That's where you go every night, isn't it? You're up to something and you don't wanna tell me about it, and that's okay. It's okay if you wanna keep me away from whatever it is, but that is what you're doing, right? You're keeping your promise?"

"Chez, I-"

"I swear I won't bring it up again. I won't mention anything to do with revenge, or ask you where you go every night ever again. I won't, if you tell me the truth right now."

The truth. What was the truth? Even Brendan didn't know what he was playing at. He didn't know if his late night outings with Steven Hay had anything to do with revenge anymore. They barely spoke about Joseph. All Brendan's enquiries revolved around finding out more about the boy.

That first night he had left work at seven thirty and taken a bottle of whisky from the top shelf of the pub. Katy had asked him what he thought he was doing. Firstly, leaving work early, then stealing her favourite bottle of whisky. She wasn't being serious, she said he was allowed to leave because it was a slow night, and he told her he had planned to pay for the bottle. She smacked him around the head when he tried to put money in the till and told him not to be so silly.

Then Anne had swanned over to them and made a joke about the bottle keeping him warm at night because Eileen was no longer going to do it. He had told Anne about the break up, when she said something about how she was sure that Eileen was really going to kill her now that she'd seen her in Brendan's flat. She wasn't too surprised by the break up. Katy on the other hand was shocked beyond belief, she was convinced Eileen was going to be the one that lasted.

She had mothered him and asked how he was dealing with the break up. He told Anne, and he told Katy that he was fine. A break up was the best thing for a relationship that was going nowhere. Katy didn't believe him, and Anne just rolled her eyes at her aunt fawning over him, and comforting him over a break up she knew he wasn't too upset about. Eventually Anne shooed her aunt away and elbowed him in his side. She told him that girls preferred a bottle of wine rather than whisky, and when he told her he didn't have a date, her face evolved into something like confusion.

"Wait a minute, you broke up with your girlfriend yesterday. Today you're asking to leave early because you have someone to meet, and you're taking an entire bottle of drink with you, meaning you're not going out for drinks and instead are having an intimate meeting indoors. Away from prying eyes and psycho ex girlfriends. You're telling me it isn't a girl?" She was convinced that he had broken up with Eileen because he had his eye on someone else.

She was wrong though, he had no intention of being indoors with Steven Hay. They were to meet by the river and have a couple of drinks. He had noticed at the party earlier that Steven couldn't hold his liquor very well. The boy had been drunk after a few cheap beers, with any luck, hard liquor would get the boy plastered, have him more willing to open up, make his tongue loose.

That was the plan.

That's not exactly how things had played out.

After leaving Anne with no response, but a mischievous smile to leave her curious, he found himself sitting under a tree in the darkness. The part of the river Steven asked to meet by, the path just outside the village, was shrouded by the woods and sitting where he was, he could see Steven sitting on the ground looking down at his phone.

He still hadn't known if he should make an appearance or not. Cheryl's voice was still in his head, demanding that he do this. That he tear apart not only Joseph, but Steven too. Brendan had sat there for god knows how long and eventually he made up his mind. He stood up and turned his back to a Steven who was now reaching for a beer.

He was going to kill Joseph, but he'd leave Steven out of it.

But then he dropped his bottle. It didn't smash, but it rolled away from him. And when he spun round to catch it before it rolled down to Steven, he saw the boy looking towards the trees with wide, wary eyes that seemed to emit a light of their own.

Those fucking blue eyes.

Before he knew it, he had picked up the bottle and was standing in front of Steven, making some joke about how he could've picked a better meeting place. Then he was chucking the boy's beers away and stating how he was going to teach him how to drink like a man. That's how Brendan started drinking whisky in the first place. This need to prove himself as a man.

He was fourteen when his father had caught him swiping a bit of whisky. He wanted to see what the big deal was. Seamus and all his friends used to drink the thing like it was made of some rare, precious fruit, like they had never tasted anything so delicious. It was disgusting, and when Seamus had seen him, he thought that was it. Thought he was about to get a black eye... or worse.

But that wasn't what had happened. He had dragged Brendan into the living room where all his waste of space friends were, and he sat him down on the sofa. The center of everyones attention. He didn't give Brendan a beating, he cheered him on. Lined up a row of shots, all for him and sat beside him. Leaned down, so he could speak directly into Brendan's ear.

Brendan could feel the spit from his mouth on his earlobes as he said, "If you want to be a man, you're gonna have to prove yourself."

He didn't last long. Three shots in and he was throwing up all over the place, made a right mess. But Seamus kept giving him more. Demanding he man up. And when he couldn't, when he couldn't stomach anymore, Seamus sneered at him, called his friends' attention.

"Ah lads, look. He's not a man, he's still that same, silly girl. From now, he's not called Brendan. He's Brenda."

They all started laughing and that made Brendan even more nauseated. Their grotesque mouths open, and their eyes watering at the pathetic being that was Brendan. Or as they liked to call him from then on, Brenda. He had run into the toilet and vomited all night, thrown up everything he had eaten that day. In the back of his mind he had known that it wasn't the alcohol making him sick, it was the chanting outside the door, the hands against slapping against each other, the stomping of the feet. The rhythm outside that made every cell in his body vibrate, the one that matched the sing song, _Brenda Brenda Brenda_.

_BRENDA!_

"BRENDAN!" It was the boy's voice that had him snap out of the memory. "I'm not having that" He had seemed adamant about that, but Brendan waved away his concerns and passed him the bottle.

He spat it out straight away. Brendan laughed at him , but part of him was a little impressed. He hadn't pulled a Brenda. He didn't throw up like a silly, little girl. And as the night went on, as they spoke about stupid things like Brendan's age and his apparently graying hair, he drank more, and after while he stopped scrunching up his face every time he took a sip. Brendan kind of liked the scrunched up face. It was kind of cute. But the kid could actually hold his drink better than Brendan.

After the vomiting incident, Brendan had stolen a bottle from his local off license and drank it till it numbed away the world. He ended up collapsed on his bedroom floor, only for Maggie to find him and freak the fuck out. He had been stomach pumped at the hospital, then his ribs cracked at home when Seamus got his hands on him. It earned him another trip to the hospital, and the story was that he felt light headed after having his stomach pumped and fell down the stairs, when he woke up to use the loo at night. That was the last time he ever stole from the off license, that was the last time whisky made him vomit or pass out. He learned to drink like a man after that.

Steven, however, was pro. He got a little tipsy, but he held up. Even managed to skip a stone with his left hand, what with him being right handed. Granted Brendan had held his hand while he did it.

Brendan had held his hand.

That was something new. He got up into peoples faces, he broke a few arms, but he never held anyone's hand the way he had Steven's. He could've let go after throwing the stone, but he hadn't, he kept his palms cupped around the back of Steven's hand. He didn't even know why. A part of him liked being close to Steven, liked the smell of his hair and the sprinkle of hair that turned blonde at the back of his neck. But another part of him wanted to push him as far away as possible, wanted to grab the stones that were on the ground and shove them down his throat, till he choked on it. That way he didn't have to hear the boy speak, he didn't have to feel the comfort he did when the boy was near him. He wasn't allowed to make Brendan feel the safest he's ever felt, and the most scared at the same time.

Eventually he broke the silence with a tache joke that Steven didn't find too funny. He avoided looking at the boy as he said it, for two reasons. One being that he wasn't sure he'd be able to hold his laughter in if he saw the boy's expression, and the other being that he wasn't ready to look at him. Looking at the boy made him forget what he was there for. He had skimmed the first stone to avoid talking about the boy's brother, even though that was the purpose of the night. He couldn't help feeling anger when Steven spoke of him with so much awe... so much respect and love. So he skimmed the stone to distract himself. When the lad sulked at his inability to master the skill as well, Brendan's anger evaporated and the boy offered him a new kind of distraction. A distraction he wasn't so sure he wanted. So he didn't look at the boy straight away, he didn't want to be distracted from his original intentions of the night, even if he couldn't get himself to speak of Joseph just yet.

But when he did look, his face cracked open into a grin, because Steven was looking at him like he had lost his marbles. He let the boy carry on thinking that he'd grow a tache. He might still do it, just to see if the boy has an aneurysm.

Then the conversation shifted, and the boy was reading him again. Analysing him, and it made him want to tear off his skin and wrap it around the boy's eyes. Blindfold him. Steven could see too much, he had looked into Brendan's eyes and he knew. He knew Brendan wasn't right. Not in the head. And more importantly, Brendan saw the same in his eyes. He saw the need to escape a life that had been too cruel to him, too young.

Brendan wanted the kid to talk to him, and as he asked the boy about his bruises, he knew that gis enquiry had nothing to do with bringing the Hay boys down. When he asked what had happened to him, he asked out of concern, he asked because he wanted the boy to trust him. Not because it would give him leverage, an insight into him to get to Joseph. But because he knew what it felt like to be so alone in a world that was slowly suffocating you. And for reasons he couldn't explain, Steven Hay was offering him a lung full of air.

He wanted the boy to breathe too.

He didn't take it. Steven told him he had walked into a door, because apparently a plank of wood was able to make him look like he had just been run over by a lawn mower. Brendan knew what had happened and he was torturing himself by asking the boy to tell him, himself. But torture was something Brendan was used to, the very fact that he was still living was a form of torture in itself. He'd stomach the details if only Steven would tell him. And maybe he'd deserve it. Deserve to know exactly what he had left the boy to handle on his own.

But Steven was letting him breathe again. He wasn't telling him anything, and a selfish part of Brendan was glad. He could've choked.

That's why he let it go.

That's why they then ended up on top of a wall surrounding Hollyoaks Sixth Form College. He let it go, but the memories wouldn't let him go. From where they had found themselves sitting, they could see the alleyway where he had left Steven screaming behind him. And before his brain could kick in, he was apologising to Steven for leaving him. The boy thought he was talking about the fact that he had left the boy alone when he went to fetch a bin, so they could climb the wall, but he wasn't.

Well, not completely.

He was sorry about that, he was also sorry about almost letting his tongue slip up and say something insensitive. He was sorry about calling him a whiny shit when the boy demanded he finish his sentence. Calling him a whiny shit was better than saying that the boy was acting like a wimp. Because he wasn't. He was braver than Brendan. He had come out with a stranger two days after being beaten to a pulp, to a place that wasn't too far from where the beating had taken place.

He was sorry about all of it, but mainly he was apologising for leaving him to Danny Houston. When he said that leaving Steven without saying anything was a dick move, he hadn't been talking about had happened five minutes prior. Leaving him without saying anything, doing anything while he was begging for someone to help him, was the dick move. And when he looked at the alley in the distance, he could still hear Steven's cries.

That's why he had held on to him when they jumped down. He didn't let him go straight away, even after he was safe on the ground. He was tangible, he was here. Brendan had left him to die, but he survived. The boy wasn't some kind of psychedelic image, he wasn't something his mind made up to make sure he'd never forget what he did. He was real. And before he had let him go, he squeezed a little harder. Just to make sure.

The relief, however, was mixed with anxiety.

You couldn't hurt a hallucination.

He shook it off and let the boy lead him to a back door of some sorts, and on the other side had been a kitchen. A massive kitchen. Steven had wandered into the place like it was his home away from home, and when Brendan expressed concern about getting caught, the boy had called him old. He wasn't trying to sound like a nagging senior citizen, but if they ended up getting arrested for this, the police would have questions as to why Brendan was hanging around with a Hay boy. Questions he probably wouldn't know how to answer.

And what if they asked Steven why he was out at night with Cheryl Brady's brother? What if he found out?

Steven had dismissed his concerns by telling Brendan that he did this all the time. Brendan should've known that. The boy did have a reputation of being a bit of an ASBO child. Yet, as the boy skipped around the kitchen, bringing out bowls and whisks and other crap, he didn't seem like a troubled kid. He looked happy, he looked like he found his calling. ASBO kids don't ask people what they want to cook, not unless they're planning on cooking methamphetamine.

But no. They didn't cook drugs. They cooked a bleeding desert. And it was fun. Frustrating, but strangely enjoyable. Or maybe it wasn't the cooking that was fun, but Steven getting his panties in a twist when Brendan messed up. He purposely broke eggs and spilled sugar, just to see Steven's lips tighten and the concentration on his face when trying not to tell Brendan to get the fuck out of his way. And when they managed to get the pots in the oven, they sat on the floor and talked.

Brendan had never been more honest in his life, than he was at that moment. When Steven asked him what he was doing here, he let the boy know that he was probably going to well and truly mess with his head. He had given him a way out, a chance to run away. And he had told him how selfish he was, that even though he'd ruin the kid's life, he was here with him. Steven with his stupid, blue eyes was like a candle in the black world he's lived in for so long.

He'd probably end up blowing that candle out.

Still, Steven didn't run away. Called him melodramatic. If only he'd heard the unfiltered version of what he had said. His real thoughts, the version where he considered Steven to be the first person in a long time to have made him genuinely smile, the only person that made him forget that he'd rather shove his head in the oven along with the Crème Brûlées, than go home. Melodramatic would not have cut it.

So he laughed. Laughed at how this kid was probably going to fuck up his life, as much Brendan will fuck up his.

The conversation turned back to Joseph after that, and Brendan shut down again. He wiped his face of any emotion and made sure the Steven couldn't see how the mention of his brother was making Brendan's blood bubble in his veins. And he stopped. Stopped talking about him. Instead, he wanted to know more about Brendan. Brendan didn't know what he was playing at when he answered Steven's questions. When people normally asked about him about his personal life, he tended to snarl at them, tell them how his foot wanted to get personal with their colon.

With Steven he didn't think twice before telling him about Maggie, and about how he had stayed home to take care of his sister because he didn't trust his father to do it. To be honest he didn't think at all. Talking to Steven was easy. It had been easy back in the boy's backyard, sitting on the floor and drinking cheap beer. And it was easy again, this time sitting in a kitchen floor and drinking whisky. If the boy knew what to ask, he'd have probably told him anything at that moment. The alcohol made his inhibition low, and his tongue free.

Thankfully they were saved by the bell. The kid wasn't his therapist, and Brendan would regret it in the morning if he unloaded on Bitesize. Not to mention, when the kid found out who he was, he would be able to hold it against him. Use it to finish him off.

When he was done with his desert, and Steven's too, he asked the kid questions about him. The boy had made note of how Brendan knew a hell of a lot more about him, than he did about Brendan. He had noticed that Brendan hadn't told him his surname. He ignored the comment, that was risky territory. He started with trivial questions, ones that he would tell anyone who asked. Ones like if he had a girlfriend, he didn't, but he thought there was something there with a bird called Rae. Rae sounded like a trashy name. She was probably just as trashy. He asked why it didn't work with his ex girlfriend now turned best friend. However, that wasn't a question he'd answer to just anyone, and he had shut Brendan down with a quip about Eileen. Brendan let it go. He couldn't care less about Amy.

After that he asked about him and his brother. Just to see if he could stomach the conversation, he'd have to do it sooner or later. The two were step brothers. He was the blonde woman, in the pink Tracksuits's kid. Joseph was the dad's. Steven was on a roll, and next Brendan asked something he'd wanted to know since the very first time he had seen Steven.

The bruise. The yellow one that was now lost amongst the sea of painful colours all over Steven's face. The one that had been fading into his golden skin the day he opened his front door to Brendan. And because Brendan's brain had turned to mush that day, he had found himself scooting closer to Steven. He lightly touched the area that was now puffy, but had been a home to a much older bruise, one that he knew Danny Houston was not responsible for. So who was?

He had just meant to show Steven the place on his face he was referring to, but instead he was brushing his fingers across those lashes that had no business being anywhere outside of a cartoon. They had fascinated him when he first saw them, and he couldn't help touching them now, he couldn't help his fingers lingering on the boy's skin even after it circulated the area the bruise had been. And when he removed his finger, he stayed put. Close to the boy. He didn't look away when Steven opened his eyes and stared right back into Brendan's own. The boy's gaze wasn't just reading him anymore, it was seeing. Even if he had torn off his skin and used it to blind him, the boy's eyes would've had burnt right through it, because they were burning through his skin and bones now.

Steven broke whatever it was that was going on by using the same excuse for the old bruise as he did for the new ones. He had walked into a door. Sure.

They moved on to talk about Stevens dyslexia and age, but of course the conversation had turned back to Joseph. Steven's life revolved around that arsehole. Somehow everything came back to him. But this time, this time the boy spoke of that night. The night it happened. Joseph Hay's twenty first birthday, the night he got a seventeen year old girl drunk and ruined her life forever. And Steven. Steven slept in the next room while it happened. Steven let it happen.

Brendan shook away his memory of that night and came back to the present where his sister was still expecting an answer from him.

He couldn't smile at her as he said, "Yes, Chez. I'm keeping my promise."

Steven let it happen. He could've stopped it if he had just listened to her cry. And now Brendan was going to listen to his sister, and he would do what she wanted him to do.

But it wasn't as easy as that though, was it? The amount of times Maggie would brush away his tears, thinking that he was crying over the death of his mother. The amount of times his Nana would hold him and promise him it was okay, but she never made it okay. Eventually, as he grew older he had stopped crying and he'd just let it happen. The less he fought back, the quicker his father left him be.

Maybe Steven did hear her cry, maybe he thought it was a dream.

Or maybe Brendan should stop making excuses for the kid and accept that he's covering for his no good, scumbag brother.

So why did he find himself telling Steven that first night that he didn't want to talk about Joseph? If he was to accept that Steven was protecting his brother, and the whole point of that night had been to get Steven drunk enough to start talking about the night of the party... why had he started a flour fight with the kid in an attempt to have him do anything, _but _talk about that night?

Maybe he had accepted that Steven was covering for Joseph, he just didn't want to be reminded of it. Because that meant that Brendan had the boy who had a hand in stealing his sister's innocence right in front of him, and instead of beating the truth out of him, Brendan walked the kid home. Made sure he was safe. He definitely had to sort out his priorities, because as he stood outside the boy's estate, he had made plans with him for the next night, and those plans had nothing to do with Joseph Hay.

Night two had revolved around their past relationships. They spoke about how Steven's ex girlfriend, Amy Barnes had a pregnancy scare two years ago when she lost her virginity to some chav. Steven was willing to step up and play daddy because he had liked Amy for a long time and didn't want to see her go through it on her own, seeing as real daddy had run a mile when he heard the news. It was a false alarm, but they decided to start a relationship anyway, it lasted about a year and there had been another pregnancy scare, before they realised they were not compatible as a couple. Steven didn't quite describe it as a scare though. Apparently he didn't mind children, really liked them in fact. If Amy was to have a kid with a loser who abandoned her, he would step up again. Not because he was in love with her, but because she saved him once and he was forever going to save her. Because she was his best friend.

He didn't elaborate as to what this saving was and Brendan didn't push it, he would have told him if he wanted to. Brendan told him about Eileen and her innate jealousy about any woman who came too close to Brendan. He told her about Anne, the closest thing he had to a best friend, and when Steven teased him about fancying her, he asked about Rae Wilson.

Big mistake.

He didn't know this girl. But he didn't like her. It was irrational, and it was uncalled for, but the mention of her name made him want to punch something.

Night three was about education and ambitions. Steven wanted to go to a culinary school that did management of a food establishment on the side. He wanted to own his own restaurant. Brendan told him about his place in University College Dublin and how he had planned to study business management, so he could teach the kid a few things. The conversation had drifted into what exactly their dream business would be like and somehow they ended up joking about how they could share a business one day. Steven with his restaurant joined with Brendan's club in the basement or something. Steven would handle the food and the customers, because Brendan seemed to lack skills in both departments, and Brendan would handle the business and numbers side. That's all it was though, a joke.

Night four had been... Actually he had no idea. That was the night they had the drinking game, and when Brendan came home, he had pissed what was probably pure whisky.

Night five they left the river side - which had quickly become their spot - for the first time. Brendan had borrowed Warren's car that night and drove Steven all the way to Liverpool, so he could show the kid a restaurant he once took Eileen to. She had begged him to take her to this place that was half club and half restaurant, and when Steven saw it he laughed that laugh of his. He ran inside like a child would a candy store. They ate first and Brendan challenged Steven to guess every single ingredient that was used to make the pasta he was eating. Then he asked the waiter to go ask the chef, and Steven was mostly correct, give or take a few ingredients. Steven had been chuffed with himself, even gave himself a pat on the back, making Brendan laugh. Then they had gone to the adjoined club, Brendan vouching for young Steven to the bouncer that he was old enough. Brendan didn't drink, but Steven had drunk so much, his movement had become like liquid.

Night six had been a quiet one. Steven had a hangover that just wouldn't quit, so he became snappy at everything. They ended up going to a movie theatre that played old movies old night and day. They watched the Die Hard series before Steven fell asleep beside him, his head on Brendan's shoulder. He let him sleep till the movie finished and after, he half carried, half dragged a zonked out Steven to the cab.

Night seven, last night, had been another night by the river. They spoke about nothing in particular. Steven joked about how Brendan was obsessed with him because he had seen him every night for a week, and Brendan told him it was a two way street. They had laughed loads and they drank loads, and the night had ended with Brendan dropping him off just outside his estate. The night ended like it did every night.

They never spoke about Jospeh again. Steven had mentioned him a couple of times in passing, but he never became the topic.

And now with his sister reminding him of his promise to her, he wondered why Joseph was never brought up again. He didn't like talking about him, but he had to do it sooner or later. He had to fulfill the entire purpose of these nights with Steven.

After he told her that he had every intention of keeping his promise, Cheryl hugged him around the waist and thanked him for everything. Being there with Carmel and doing what she asked. He didn't hug her back. He let her hold on, but his arms remained by his side. She didn't notice though, she gave him a smile, then went back up the stairs to solitary. He hated that the only thing that made her smile was the promise of revenge.

When she was out of sight, he picked up the coffee she made for him, but as he placed the mug between his lip, an image of Steven Hay flashed through his mind. The way the boy's mouth looked when he pouted, that was his favourite. How he puckered his lips out when he was annoyed or didn't get things his way. For the past week, Brendan started doing it on purpose, stomping on his last nerves. All so he could see the boy sulk. It always made him smile. But then he'd apologise for being a jerk and he'd let the boy get his way. His second favourite memory of the boy was the smile he'd have after Brendan gave into him.

The sound of smashing and an ear splitting roar had the image flutter away from his mind. When he looked at the wall, with its dripping coffee and smashed pieces of his mug that scattered the floor beneath it, he realised the roar was from him. Cheryl called him from her room, asked if everything was okay and he said it was. He told her he tripped over his foot. But it wasn't alright, and he didn't trip. Steven Hay was messing with his head, and the kid didn't even know it. He didn't even know that, not only did his brother ruin his sister, but he was now ruining everything Brendan thought he lived for. He thought he lived to protect his sister, but he wasn't doing that when Steven Hay was in his mind.

Fuck.

Brendan cleaned up his mess and headed into his bedroom. He needed a shower. Maybe he could scrub away the effect Steven was having on him. And he definitely was not going to see the boy tonight. He went into his closet to grab a towel, when his phone buzzed on his bedside table.

_From: Steven Hay_

_Nights off. Soz. Made plans that I cant get out of._

Whoa whoa whoa, what?

Steven Hay was not cancelling on him. They hadn't made any specific plans, and they hadn't said that they were going to meet up again, but it was a sort of unwritten thing. It didn't need to be said that they had plans again. And even if Brendan was going to cancel himself, Steven was not allowed to ditch him. No way. That was not how it worked. Brendan was in charge here.

He didn't text Steven back. He called him.

The phone barely rung before Steven picked up with a whisper, "Bren?"

"No, it's the tooth fairy. It stole my phone instead of my teeth. Of course it's me." He didn't know why he was being stroppy with the kid, he had every intention of ditching the boy tonight too.

"Alright, keep your facial hair on. Who pushed you out the wrong side of your bed this morning?"

"Yeah, yeah, what's this about tonight?" He tried to keep his tone breezy. Unbothered.

"Yeah, sorry about that. You didn't have anything planned, did -"

"No." Brendan interrupted him mid sentence, and the abrupt no had Steven silenced on the other side. He didn't want him thinking that he was looking forward to seeing Steven. He wasn't.

Steven didn't say anything for a while. Seemingly a little stunned by Brendan's curt answer.

Eventually he said, "Okay." Silence. "Erm Brendan, I gotta go. It's my first day back in school and I had to get a toilet pass to come out and text you. They start wondering, if we're gone too long."

What had been the purpose of this call? If he wanted to let Steven know he wasn't bothered, he should've ignored the text or replied with a simple, _okay. _But no, he had to call the boy and find himself looking for something to say, because he didn't want him to hang up.

"Sure." That's all he could muster up, but when the boy had said goodbye, his mouth ran away from his brain again. "Steven, Steven, wait?"

"Yeah?"

Oh god, what was he supposed to say? "Erm, what are you doing tonight, then?"

Jesus. Not that. Not THAT. Great, now Brendan really sounded like he didn't give a shit about what the boy was cancelling on him for.

"Me brother and I, and a few mates are going to have dinner with that guy mentioned, Tony. Remember him?"

"No." Lie. He did remember. Steven spoke about him on night three, when he told Brendan how he had gotten into cooking. Dom, Anthony's brother was his teacher at college, and Anthony owned the Italian restaurant where he had taught Steven pretty much everything he knew.

"Oh." Silence. Brendan had hurt his feelings. Steven told him about someone close to him, and Brendan was acting like he hadn't listened. Good, he was hurt. He was ditching Brendan for a night with that arsehole brother.

"Amy and Rae the friends?" He wasn't interested.

"Yeah, and erm... Doug."

Doug? DOUG?! Who the fuck was Doug? Steven talked a lot, like he wouldn't stop to breathe, if he could help it. Not once did he mention this Douglas.

"He's...er Bren, I really have to go. I have lunch at one, if you want to call back."

No, he didn't want to call back. He wanted to know who the hell this Douglas was, he wanted to know why they were all having dinner with Anthony, and he wanted to know why he couldn't meet Brendan after. Most of all, he wanted to know all this now. Not later. For the past week, he'd dropped off Steven at about three to four am. How long did dinner with a few people last?

"Whatever." He hung up on Steven. Didn't even let the boy say bye. He _wanted_ to know all those things, he wasn't _desperate_ to know.

So why was he standing at their spot by the river at one pm and ringing Steven's phone? Jesus Christ, he needed help.

"Steven," Brendan said as soon as the boy picked up.

"Brendan, I'm barely out of class, what's your problem?"

"Come to the river."

"Why?"

"Because after seven nights in a row, alone with you, I want to kill you in broad daylight."

Brendan didn't have to see Steven to know that he was rolling his eyes at him. "Are you capable of ever giving a straight answer?"

"I am, but you don't make it easy. I'm by the river. Got you a sandwich, if you're hungry. I gotta be at work soon, so hurry your arse up."

A sound escaped from Steven's mouth, ready to answer Brendan, when he heard a voice in the background. Male. It was asking him if the dinner tonight was casual, seeing as it was in a posh Italian restaurant. Steven laughed and told the guy to wear whatever he wanted, because if Steven had it his way, he'd turn up in his PJs. The other boy laughed too and said he'd see him later and Steven said bye back. Called him Doug.

Douglas was a fucking rude bastard. Unless this guy was blind, he could see that Steven was on the phone. Wait for him to hang up before you start a conversation with him, god dammit.

Etiquette, people.

"You were saying, Bren."

"Oh, so you do know I'm still on the phone."

Steven sighed on the other end. Brendan was being a an aul git. "Brendan, I don't think I can meet you now. I haven't seen my friends in a week. They want to have lunch with me, catch up. We won't be able to do that when having dinner with Tony, and his brother will probably be there. Dom's my teacher so..."

Brendan didn't say anything for a while. He didn't know how to respond to that. He had seen him every day; his friends had a right to spend time with him. They were his friends, and Brendan was... Brendan was a guy that gate crashed a party at his house.

"Brendan, you still there?"

"Yeah." Swallow. "Listen, it's fine. I just had an hour to kill, but you're at school, so... I'll see you when I see you."

"Yeah… Brendan?"

"What's up?"

There was a muffling sound of a girl's whiny voice on Steven's end, then Steven's annoyed, "Fuck's sake, Rae, I'm coming." That made Brendan smile. The lad was never going to shag this girl if he treated her like crap. "Rae, Amy, I'm coming, just go, I'll catch up." Then he turned his attention back to Brendan. His tone wasn't irritated anymore, it was hopeful, "See you soon."

Then he hung up. Probably ran after his friends. Apologised to that Rae bird for snapping at her, gave her cheeky smile. Texted fucking Douglas and told him he was excited about tonight. And Brendan, Brendan was left standing on the spot where he had taught Bitesize how to skim a stone. He chucked the sandwich he got for Steven in.

He might as well go to work early, he had nothing better to do.

At work, Anne was sitting behind the bar, filing her nails. Katy was serving drinks along with Rhys Ashworth. He never really spoke to the bloke, didn't know much about him. He worked the shifts Brendan didn't, so their paths rarely crossed. When he saw Brendan make his way behind the bar, his eyes had lit up with the hope of leaving early. Katy slapped the back of his head, removing the notion from his thought process. She gave Brendan a cheery smile and told him that, seeing as he was here early for once, he could maybe drag Anne away from her nail kit.

When he went up to Anne, that wasn't quite what had happened. She leapt up from her seat and dragged Brendan upstairs to her living room. She sat him down on the sofa, and grabbed his hand. Started giving it a manicure. He would've shoved her away, but life was easier when you let Anne do what she wanted.

"You'll never guess what."

Brendan was too busy watching her file his nail to play the game. The speed in which she worked with his nail was kind of hypnotic. "What?"

"Riley is dating Mercedes McQueen."

Brendan sniggered at her scandalised tone and she responded by filing his flesh, rather than his nail.

"Anne, c'mon. Who hasn't had their time with Mercedes McQueen? Even I've had a couple of drinks with her, and you know 'tramp' ain't my taste."

Anne curled her top lip at the news that, yes, Brendan did have drinks with the wide hipped McQueen girl. "Eurgh."

She let his hand go and leaned back into the sofa. She crossed her arm and sighed deeply. It made Brendan laugh at her more and it earned him a shove to the shoulder.

"Look, Anne. I can bet my left testicle that they won't last too long. She'll either cheat on him with his dad or something, or he'll realise he's madly, deeply in love with you." He elbowed her in the side. She was supposed to smile, not grumble under her breath about how Mercedes McQueen was a massive slut. "The former seems like a more likely possibility." She shoved him again, and when he grinned at her, she finally smiled back.

"What do I care, anyway? If he wants to get his heart broken by that thing, that's fine by me."

"And when he comes looking for a shoulder to cry on, your's will be all ready for him."

"No, it won't. I'm not gonna listen to him moan about her." She signalled the end of that topic by asking him what he was doing here so early; he hardly ever came in on time.

"I have a sixth sense; I knew you were desperate to talk to me."

Anne had made herself comfortable on the sofa, shoes off and lying down, feet on Brendan's lap. "Mmhmm, is it the new girl you've been seeing?"

Brendan sighed, "For the last time, there is no new girl."

"Well excuse me for wondering where you run off to every night recently, straight after work. Then come in the next day looking like death warmed up."

Brendan didn't reply. He just stared at the tv, didn't even know what was on. He couldn't tell her what was up with him, he didn't know himself. He was annoyed with Steven for cancelling tonight, even though he was going to do it himself. He was annoyed with Steven for choosing to spend time with Joseph and Rae and Amy and this Douglas that he never mentioned before, instead of him. He was annoyed that Steven hadn't come out to see him for lunch. And he had no right to be annoyed. About anything. Steven didn't owe him anything.

"Don't wanna talk about it?" Anne asked when he remained silent.

He chuckled. It was humourless. "Don't really know what to say."

Anne didn't reply straight away, not until he turned to look at her. She had a concerned face, like she wanted to ask him for the details, but was scared about what he'd say at the same time.

"Well when you do, I'm here. You do know that, Brendan, right?"

He nodded at her without saying anything, and then they turned their attention back to the tv. Neither of them was really watching it, she was probably thinking about Riley and Mercedes, and he was just wondering what his head was playing at, it made no sense. They stayed like that, in comfortable silence, until Katy called them down for their shift. They walked down without saying anything, it was the last few seconds before they had to face people and slap a fake persona on. Anne's Mitzeee, and Brendan's charming yet ruthless persona. As soon as they stepped foot into the bar, the masks were up.

His shift went as it always did. A few spilt drinks here, a guy who had too much too soon, but wanted more. A girl flirting with him, asking him for his number, and Anne playing the role of a hurt girlfriend when he struggled to turn them down gently. Vise versa when someone hit on her, except Bredan didn't do upset, he did furious. It tended to scare off any other guy in the room who had thoughts about getting into Anne's pants. He did everything he would normally do while working, and he kept any thoughts of Steven at bay. But at one point the little bastard seeped through into his mind, when a school kid tried to fool Brendan into thinking he was old enough to be served. He sent the kid packing, and the kid left him wondering what Steven was up to.

And when eight o'clock came, and his shift ended, he stayed. Katy and Anne asked him why he wasn't heading straight for the door, but he just shrugged. That was the only response he was going to give them. Katy didn't seem too bothered, he was good behind the bar, and if he wasn't threatening a punter, he was probably her best barman. Anne, however, gave him that concerned face again before she turned and left him to pulling a pint.

It was ten o clock when he was exhausted and collapsed on to Anne's bed upstairs. He'd worked an eight hour shift on very little sleep, and he needed to relax for five minutes before he headed home. Anne was still downstairs at the bar; she didn't do much work, so she didn't get tired too quickly. Not to mention she disappeared every hour for a fifteen minute break, claiming her feet were killing her. Maybe she should stop wearing six inch heels.

Brendan was looking at a photograph of Anne, her mum and her sister on her bedside table, when he heard the unmistakable tapping of Anne's shoes outside the bedroom. Then she was knocking and poking her head in.

"There's something incredibly wrong about knocking on my own bedroom door." She grinned at him as fully entered the room.

"There's something incredibly wrong with people who knock on doors, but don't wait for an answer before they come in."

She sat on the bed next to him, "Hey, it's my room."

"Okay, what was your excuse when you invited yourself into my bedroom while I was still asleep, and threw a bucket of water over me? I don't remember you even knocking."

"Brendan, seriously, let it go." She grinned at him and grabbed the photo that he had just been looking at a moment ago.

Brendan didn't know much about her family. She never spoke about her dad and she barely spoke to her sister, they had a falling out about Maxine - the sister - sleeping with a boyfriend of hers. She missed her mum, but she had come to Chester to try her luck with fame. That's when she started calling herself Mitzeee; her stage name. She got a few modelling jobs here and there, but at the end of the day, she was still a barmaid. Brendan wondered how much longer she'd try this fame thing before she gave up and headed home. He'd miss her.

"There's someone looking for you downstairs." She was still looking at the picture frame as she spoke.

"Me?" Who would be looking for Brendan. His father never drank here. His sister wasn't exactly leaving the house, and Warren would just come up. It would've annoyed Katy and Anne, but he still would've done it. This meant it was probably Danny. He wasn't ready to see Danny. He had left his phone downstairs in his jacket which was in the coat closet; the guy must've been blowing up his phone.

Anne looked up and laughed at his expression. "Don't look so worried. If the guy downstairs wants to kill you, I think you can take him on."

He could probably take Danny on, but Danny would send a mob after him if he tried.

He stood up, left the room and made his way downstairs, Anne close behind. When he came out to the bar and saw who it was, he wished he had gone home earlier.

He felt Anne'd lips close to his ears as she whispered, "Says his name is Ste." When Brendan turned to look at her, lie to her, tell her it was some random boy that he was helping out with something, she raised an eyebrow and said, "Hay. Ste Hay."

And then Steven turned around, saw Brendan standing there with Anne who was silently asking him thousands of questions. He could've still lied. Told her that he had no idea what Joseph Hay's little brother was doing here, looking for him.

But Steven didn't help the situation when he hollered, "Hiya Bren."

Jesus, Mary and Joseph.


	10. Chapter 10

A massive thank you to BeautifulFreaks- on tumblr for the fic's cover image.

**Chapter 10**

The day had been pretty much perfect, apart from an incident in the morning. Ste couldn't wait to tell Brendan about the opportunity he was being given. But then Doug said something. Something that made his insides feel like it had been doused in liquid nitrogen. He learned that in school, how nitrogen was so cold it could freeze things in an instant, make it into ice. And when he saw Brendan standing on the other side of the bar, it felt like someone had gotten a hammer and smashed his frozen insides into a thousand pieces.

Xxx

It was past three am when Ste crept into the house and tripped over Joey on his bedroom floor, once he entered his room. He giggled and apologised and cursed himself for being too drunk to hold his giddiness in. If Terry heard him, he would've come in, knuckles bared. But Terry slept through, like he did every night. Joey, on the other hand, was wide awake and catching Ste before he fell face first. This was the first time Joey caught him coming in so late. Normally he was fast asleep.

"Are you ever gonna tell me where you go every night, only to come home when the birds start singing?"

Okay, he thought Joey was normally fast asleep.

He never mentioned anything to Ste, not at night. He did bounce on the bed in the mornings to irritate him, knowing that he hadn't had much sleep. He asked a few times where Ste was going before he left to meet up with Brendan, but when Ste used to tell him to mind his own, he let it be. He still texted every other hour, and Ste made sure he texted back. He might not have wanted to tell Joey where he was going, or who he was with, but that didn't mean he wanted his brother to sit at home, chewing his fingers raw with worry.

"I told ya, Joeh. I'm just hanging out with a mate." His accent became stronger when he was drunk.

"This mate a vampire?" Joey asked as he helped Ste take off his jacket that somehow got stuck halfway down his arm.

After relieving Ste of his outerwear, Joey helped the increasingly drowsy Ste out of his shoes and socks before putting him to bed, fully clothed. Ste was too lethargic for Joey to even attempt to have him sit up straight to take off his hoodie, or anything else for that matter. The older Hay pulled the duvet only half way up his brother's body, so he wouldn't overheat while he slept. Then he sat at the edge of the bed.

"Ste? You already asleep?"

Ste was somewhere between dreamland and real land, so he managed to let out a soft humming sound before sleep could completely take over. Joey took it as a sign that he was listening.

"Ste, I just... I don't want to nag. I don't want to act like a dad here. I thought we were mates."

"We are." Ste mumbled, burying his face further into his pillow. He hoped Joey would get the hint and leave this conversation, at least till the morning.

No such luck. Joey wasn't letting this go. "Where do you go every night? You normally tell me everything."

That was the problem though. He did tell Joey everything, but he didn't want to tell him about Brendan. There was something about the nights that was surreal. None of it felt like it was part of the real world. It was just him and the dark haired boy doing whatever they felt like doing. They could be joking around about dreams businesses one day, then actually going to a place that looked exactly like that dream another day. If Ste hadn't had the hangover of the century the next day, he would've sworn that it never happened. But he did have a hangover, and that hangover had been a result of trying to use alcohol to understand why Brendan made him feel in a way that no one had ever made him feel before.

Ste didn't want to tell Joey about Brendan. He'd bring a sense of realism with him if he did. Joey would be like the pin to the little bubble he had with the older boy. He'd have to explain to Joey why he has blind faith in a boy, who could really be anyone. It wasn't a question Ste knew the answer to, and it wasn't a question he wanted to think about for too long. That would mean trying to figure it out, and that made his head hurt, and his stomach lurch.

"There's really nothing to tell. I have new mate who I'm just getting to know more."

Joey climbed higher up on the bed, so he was fully sitting at the foot with his legs crossed, facing Ste. "Why can't you get to know him more during the day?" He gave a loud sigh and combed his fingers through his hair. "Is he ashamed to be seen with you, because of me?"

And there it was. This notion that anything in Ste's life had something to do with Joey. And he was probably right about most things, and that was partly the reason he didn't want to tell Joey anything. Joey would get involved, want to get to know Brendan. Then he wouldn't be Ste's friend, he'd be the Hay boys' friend. Ste wanted this to be his own.

Anyway, the idea to meet up so late had always been Ste's idea. If he was out too much at daytime, Terry would notice his absence. At night, Terry would go to the pub and come back after it closed to drink more at home, before he headed to bed. He wouldn't even think twice about Ste's whereabouts. At day time, he'd be demanding to know where the little scrote was, demanding him to go out and buy him more beers, more crisps, more this, more that. So he'd leave the house not long after Terry and his mum did, it saved a lot of aggro.

"Look, it's just a mate from college. I haven't exactly been to the place to socialise with him. And going out at night, saves a beating from Terry when he can't find me during the day."

"What's his name?"

"Who?"

Shit, shit, shit.

"Your college mate."

Bullocks.

Ste sat up on his bed, adjusted the pillow, so he could lean on it. He was trying to give himself some time to think. He needed a name. Justin? No, he left Hollyoaks. Dave? Nope, Dave's brother was Joey's mate; Ste could easily get caught out with that lie. John Paul? Fuck no, Ste moaned about him being a stuck up piece of fat for too long, for him to be Ste's bezzie mate all of a sudden. But...

"Doug." Ste said with an air of confidence that he actually lacked. He was glad they were in the dark; the lie was no doubt visible on his face. "His name is Doug."

"Doug?" Joey rolled the name around on his tongue as if, if he said it enough times, he'd spontaneously know who the boy was. "Never heard of him."

"He's American. Hasn't been here for too long." As if that would explain why Joey didn't know him. "We sort of became friends not too long ago."

Joey nodded silently, taking the information in. "How comes you've never mentioned him before? How comes he can stay up till the early hours with you, but still manage to make it into college in the morning?"

Awh damn. "I don't know, Joey. I didn't ask. I hang out at his, we play the Xbox, drink a lot, then I come home. I don't ask him about his morning routine; I'm not interested."

Pretty much everything that came out of Ste's mouth was a lie. He didn't have a clue as to where the guy he spent his nights with lived. He didn't know if he even played computer games, let alone own an Xbox. Even the part about not knowing his morning routine was a lie. Ste had asked Brendan once, how he managed to wake up in the mornings. Ste could sleep, seeing as he wasn't going college, but how did Brendan survive? He had told him he didn't work mornings, so he didn't have to wake up till he felt like it, except for when his friend Anne decides to pop over uninvited, and throw a bucket of water over him.

Ste liked how he talked about Anne; he also kind of hated it. Well, up until he said how she was like a sister to him. For some reason, that little tit bit of information settled a feeling inside of him that felt dangerously like jealousy. So what if Brendan fancied Anne? Brendan's romantic life was his own. It had nothing to do with his so called friendship with Ste.

He spoke about the girl with fondness, despite saying how much she annoyed him, how much she would do things that really bugged him, and how many times he was on the verge of killing her. Ste wondered if he spoke about him like that. Brendan was always saying something insulting to him, maybe when he spoke about Ste to other people, told them about the brat he met and spent his nights with, he said it with a glint in his eye. It was more likely that he never spoke about Ste to anyone though, just like Ste didn't talk about him to even Joey. Maybe he was Brendan's something secret, something he didn't want to share.

Joey was looking at him curiously, even in the darkness of the room; he could see the scepticism on his older brother's face. Joey could perhaps see the deception on Ste's.

"Can I meet him?" Joey asked.

"No." He hadn't even let the question completely enter his brain to formulate an answer that didn't make him sound like he was a petulant child. When Joey asked the question, Ste thought he meant Brendan, and he didn't want Joey to meet him. But Joey meant Doug. He raised an eyebrow at Ste's sudden answer. "Erm, I mean why?"

Joey shrugged, "Be nice to meet the guy that's making my brother come home drunk and giggly. Y'know, I thought it was maybe a girl, that's why you were keeping it a secret."

Well... That would've been an easier lie.

Joey used his own foot to nudge Ste's when he said, "thought maybe she was a pig and you knew that if you told me, I'd want to meet her. Thought maybe a face like her's was one that belonged hidden in the dark."

He laughed and Ste joined him because they hadn't done that in a while. Just sit up at night and kid around.

"Look, remember I told you Tony wanted to see you?"

Ste nodded in response. He remembered, he just couldn't find the time to see the man, and Tony would never come into Ste's house. Ste made that clear one time when he called Tony to tell him he couldn't work at the restaurant that day because he wasn't feeling well. Tony didn't believe him, thought he was up to no good, so he told Ste he was coming over to see him. But Ste couldn't have that. Told Tony not to ever come to his house, otherwise he'd quit the restaurant completely. He couldn't have had Tony come over; he couldn't have let Tony see Terry's raw knuckles or his bust face. Or even Joey's face when he came to intervene.

"Well seeing as you're nonexistent recently, he's asked me to tell you that we're invited to the restaurant for dinner. Said you could invite Amy and that bird you've had your eye on. Rae." He raised an eyebrow at his younger brother. "Unless you've moved on."

"Joey, I'm not seeing a girl at night." Ste kicked his brother's foot to get his point across, but he didn't deny that he had maybe, possibly moved on. He didn't really care if he got Rae. If he did, great. If he didn't, no big deal.

Joey grinned, "I believe you."

Ste rolled his eyes. "What's this dinner about? Why does he want to see me so bad?"

Joey got up from the bed and went over to his blow up mattress. He kicked it a few times to check if it needed to be pumped again, and when he was satisfied, he climbed in.

"You should probably change your clothes, now that you're a bit more awake." He avoided Ste's question. "If you fall asleep in it, you'll sweat like mad and they'll start to stink."

"There's a thing called the washing machine, and answer my question." Ste pulled off his jumper anyway and chucked it at Joey's head, before standing up to shuffle out of his jeans and doing the same with that too.

"Yeah, a machine you don't know how to use. A machine Mum goes nowhere near, so I'm left doing the laundry." He chucked Ste's clothes to a part of the room that had a small mountain of dirty clothes accumulating. "As for Tony." He took a pause, figuring out how much he should say to Ste. "Look just turn up, it's nothing bad. It's a surprise." He took another pause, used it to adjust and fluff his pillows. Finally he said, "bring Doug."

Ste was back in bed now, and he wished that when he pulled the duvet over his head, this whole conversation would just disappear. "I don't think so, Joey."

Joey barely let Ste finish his sentence before he said, "please, Ste. I feel like I'm losing you to this guy here. Let me at least have the ease of mind in knowing that I'm losing you to someone I can put a face to." He reached up from the floor and pulled the duvet down from over Ste's face. "I want you to be able to tell me anything. Absolutely anything."

Joey was looking at Ste with an expression he couldn't put a name to. It was a look that was concerned, pleading, hopeful, and something that looked like he could pierce into Ste's thoughts. Like he knew something about Ste, that Ste didn't know himself.

"You're not losing me to anyone, Joey." A part of Ste knew that his brother had said that to guilt trip him. Whether he really thought that or not, he voiced it because he knew Ste would want to prove him wrong. "I'll invite Doug to the stupid dinner."

Joey reached up further to ruffle Ste's hair with a Cheshire cat grin on his face. He smiled back at his brother, but as the older boy settled back down to sleep and turned, so that his back was to Ste, Ste dropped the smile. He was glad that he made Joey happy, but what was he supposed to do now? Doug wasn't the one he hung out with; he barely ever said two words to the American. How was he supposed to invite this guy to an intimate dinner with some of the closest people to him, when he didn't even know a thing about the guy? Well other than the fact that he was American, gay, and had shite taste in boyfriends. I mean John Paul, really?

Ste had barely slept when he looked at his phone to check the time. He read seven seventeen am, when he climbed out of bed. With sleepiness still hanging over him, he tripped on the edge of the blowup mattress, waking Joey up.

"What are you doing awake?" The older Hay asked, his voice groggy with sleep.

"It's been a week. Thought I'd head back to school. I may have been beaten up, but Mr. Blake is still looking for a reason to kick me out of his precious school. Poor attendance would be a perfect reason."

That was true, but he also had to talk to Doug. Get him to come to this thing today, without seeming like a complete weirdo. He didn't have Doug's number, so he couldn't just call from home and explain the situation; he had to actually find him. Anyway, telling him to come to dinner with him would probably be less creepy face to face. Or at least he hoped.

"You sure you're ready?" Joey was all worry, like he always was.

"As I'll ever be." Ste left the room to go brush his teeth, all the while trying to come up with a way to approach Doug.

Joey was already in the living room when Ste went in there with his cup of coffee; he was going to need it. He could already feel the pull of sleep, dragging at his eyelids. He sat next to his brother who was watching TV in silence, his feet on the sofa and knees drawn up close to his chest. The look in his eyes was blank and when Ste asked him if he was okay, the older boy just continued to stare ahead.

Ste crouched down, so his mouth was right by his brother's ear when he screamed, "JOEY!"

Joey pushed his younger brother off the sofa and stuck a finger in his maltreated ear, wiggled the digit around to make sure his eardrums hadn't burst. "Dammit, Ste! You could've made me deaf and woken up Mum and Dad."

Ste laughed it off and sat back down next to Joey and repeated his earlier question. Joey didn't reply, and instead he passed him an envelope. It didn't have a stamp or return address, so it was definitely hand delivered. When Ste opened it, it was filled with little snippets of articles to do with rapists. One was about a Texas father who had beaten his daughter's rapist to death. There was one about a man who tracked down rapists and killed them with an axe. Another was about an inmate that had disemboweled and murdered a rapist that had shared his cell with him. There were loads.

Ste couldn't read the articles properly, but he got the idea. Joey and Ste both knew that this was somebody warning his older brother, warning him that if he stayed out of prison, people would come after him, if he didn't... Well, nobody liked a rapist. Not even criminals. Ste stuffed the articles back in the envelope and scrunched it up, before heading to the kitchen and setting the damn thing on fire. If he chucked it in the bin, he knew that Joey would probably dig it out again; just to torture himself with what he probably thought was inevitable.

When he came back to the living room, Joey was still in the position he had left him earlier, and he looked so vulnerable. So unlike him. Ste told him to forget about it, and it was probably kids who had nothing better to do than torment him. He said how he needed to shake out of the funk he was in, because they had a fancy dinner with Tony that night, and he was going to meet Doug. Yep, Ste definitely needed to find a way to invite him. Joey needed the distraction.

His older brother smiled at him and told him he was needed at the restaurant by five. Dinner wasn't till later, but it was important that he came extra early. And When Ste left for school, Joey was slightly more like his old self again. But it didn't take a genius to know that it was an act for Ste's benefit.

On his way to school, he called Amy who met up with him half way to college. They'd normally take the bus, but Ste hadn't done that since everything with Joey. He didn't need to be in a confined place where he was trapped with people judging him. So they walked, and at the gates they found Rae who gave Ste a coy smile. A part of Ste wanted to laugh at her. Now that he had the girls together, he told them about dinner with Tony and they were both were up for it. Now he had to find Doug.

He couldn't find the American before class started, but at break time, Ste saw him buying something at the vending machine.

"Hey, Doug right?" Ste asked from behind the boy.

It startled him and he jumped a little and dropped the packet of crisps he had just bought. "Oh shit." He picked up his snack and turned around to look at Ste with a bit of a flush crawling up his neck. "Erm yeah." He cleared his throat. "You're Ste."

Doug was being all sorts of clumsy and awkward, and it made Ste want to push him with frustration and laugh at him at the same time. "I know. I don't need you to tell me, me name." He joked, but Doug dropped his smile. "I'm kidding. No need to look so worried." Doug gave him a nervous laugh, and Ste took it as his cue to carry on. "Look erm, I was wondering if you could do me a favour..."

Ste heard his name being called from somewhere, and he knew it was Amy before she had even reached him. She asked what he was doing, and he got rid of her by telling her he needed to talk to Doug in private and he'd see her in a bit. Hopefully she would keep Rae away too. When Ste turned back to Doug, the American looked a little green, like he was going to throw up from nerves.

What the hell was his problem?

"So erm, your McQueen won't like this."

"We broke up." He answered abruptly, like he wanted... No, needed Ste to know that John Paul would not be an issue. "He erm, we... He said he loved me and I couldn't say it back."

Ste raised an eyebrow. "Thank you, Doug. I was really gagging to know about your love life."

"Oh, sorry."

Ste laughed this time and rolled his eyes. Doug was a mess. At least the break up explained why he looked like he wanted to run and hide under his bed.

"Look, I'm just going to get to the point." Ste took a deep breath. "My brother and a few mates are having dinner with Tony, this guy that we know." He waited till Doug nodded to signal that he was following Ste. "And My brother wants to meet a mate of mine that I've been spending a lot of time with recently. Except that mate isn't exactly someone I can or even want to invite to have a cosy meal with my brother." Doug frowned, not exactly understanding what Ste was asking him. "I was wondering if you could maybe just...Pretend you were the mate. I already told him it was you. You just need to pretend that I was at your house most nights, and we stay up playing your Xbox and drinking cheap beer."

"I - I- Why did you tell him it was me?" Doug stuttered.

"Well, my brother knows a lot of the guys my age, he'd probably find out I was lying. He doesn't know you, and you seem pretty cool. We could pull off being mates." Ste looked at the boy up and down and ate his words. "Okay, the knitwear and chinos ain't exactly my thing, but I can work with you."

Doug shook his head, "I don't understand. You want me to come to this dinner with your brother and mates, hosted by some guy called Tony?" Ste nodded in response. "And you want me to pretend to be a mate of yours that your brother wants to meet, because the real mate is...?"

"Is never gonna happen. He'd probably laugh at me and tell me there's more chance the devil would join us for dinner."

"Why don't you just tell your brother that this guy doesn't want to come?"

Ste sighed. He couldn't explain his situation with Brendan. It was hard for him to understand himself. "Look are you gonna do this or not? I'll owe you or whatever."

Doug shook his head again, "You don't have to owe me. I'll come."

Ste grinned and hugged the American, because it felt like a load off his shoulders. He took Doug's number from him, and texted him his own. "So if my brother asks, we know each other from college. Which is true. We meet during the evenings because that's when I prefer it, and it means you can get your college work out of the way." Ste looked at him up and down again, "you look like someone who actually does their homework." Doug laughed and Ste carried on with his instructions, "we talk a bit, but not much because we end up playing really heated games of Call of Duty well into the night, till about three-ish in the morning. We eat cold pizza and drink a load of beer, that's why I tend to come home drunk. We've been doing this for seven nights in a row. He might ask you how you get to college in the morning after such late nights, you think of an excuse for that. Meet me at the Italian restaurant, Il Gnosh at five pm. Any questions?"

"Erm...I think I should've taken notes." He chuckled, then asked, "If I'm pretending to be your night friend, who's the real guy?"

"That's your only question?" Ste asked in reply, and when Doug nodded, he sighed and said, "five pm at Il Gnosh. Be there. Amy and Rae are coming too." He left the boy standing at the vending machine, clutching onto a packet of crisps.

It was only when he as half way through listening to Dom telling him that a broken arm was not an excuse for burning down half his kitchen, that he remembered Brendan might be expecting him tonight. He didn't know what the purpose of this dinner was, and he didn't know how long it'd last. He couldn't have Brendan waiting on him. Not that he thought the dark haired boy would actually wait. Just in case though.

Dom was going on and on, and to be honest exaggerating. Ste had been too busy worrying about Joey finding out about his lies, and how Joey was doing with what happened this morning, to be paying attention to the fact that a towel had caught on fire. It was small, but Dom being Dom, had to make a mountain out of a mole hill. The thing hadn't even set the sprinklers off.

Mid lecture, Ste interrupted him and asked to go to the toilet, he needed to text Brendan. Dom was put out, but when Ste told him he'd pee himself and that would do nothing to help the hygiene of the kitchen, he had to let him go.

He locked himself in a booth and texted Brendan. He wasn't expecting a text back, and Brendan never really called him. He did once, when they were at that club and he had got lost in the crowd. But they never had a conversation on the phone. There was too much pressure to make sure the conversation flowed. They could sit in comfortable silence when they were together, but over the phone, it was just awkward.

Ste took a slash, seeing as he was in the toilet, he might as well. But then Brendan rang him midstream, and he had a bit of a heart attack. He picked up straight away, and the first thing Brendan said was in sarcasm. Of course. He wanted to know what was happening tonight and Ste wanted to apologise in case he had anything planned, Brendan cut him off with a "No." No he didn't have anything planned, and it made Ste feel silly. Silly that he had felt bad about not being able to see the older boy, when the older boy couldn't care less.

Eventually he told Brendan that he had to get back to class, but as he was about to hang up, Brendan stopped him. Asked him what he was doing tonight. Ste didn't think much of it; he was probably bored and was making conversation. He told him about the dinner with Tony, but Brendan didn't remember him. He didn't remember a huge chunk of what Ste told him. He spoke to Brendan about the guy who was good to him when he had no reason to be, and Brendan didn't listen to any of it. He didn't care.

He asked who the friends that were going were, and Ste told him about Amy and Rae. He knew who they were. He'd asked about them. Ste eventually told him about Doug, and for some reason, Brendan didn't sound too happy. Ste didn't know how to go about explaining this situation with the American. He worried that telling Brendan he was using Doug as a replacement, so Joey wouldn't find out about him, wouldn't go down well with him. Brendan didn't seem like the type who took replacement easily. Technically, Ste wasn't replacing. He was being selfish and keeping Brendan for himself. But that's not something he was going to tell him.

He hung up on Ste, and Ste was left saying bye to a dead tone. Brendan was schizophrenic, he had to be. Sometimes it seemed like he wanted to know everything under the sun about Ste, and Ste alone. But then there were times like this, when Ste thought that he was just something to pass the time with for Brendan. Something he could just as easily not have in his life, despite what Brendan had said about Ste being someone that offered him some kind of goodness. Brendan was giving Ste a headache.

He headed back to class and Dom eyed him for taking so long, but didn't say anything. He got on with the rest of the class with zero concentration as to what he was doing. He boiled over some water, and then accidently burnt the arm of a girl who came to help him do damage control. He spilled ingredients on the floor, and made an even bigger mess when he tried to clean it up with one arm. Eventually class came to an end, and he could see the relief on Dom's face as he left the classroom. He wasn't distracted by thoughts and concerns of Joey anymore; he was worried that Brendan maybe loosing whatever interest he had in Ste. He was getting bored of him.

Except Ste's phone started ringing as soon as he stepped foot out of the kitchen. When he picked up, he didn't let Brendan know that he was glad about the phone call. But his heart sank when Brendan asked to meet him by the river. He wanted to go, he really fucking did, but he had already promised to have lunch with Amy and Rae. They'd made him feel bad about not seeing him all week. They told him that they wouldn't be able to mess around when they're with Tony, they wouldn't be able to just catch up if they were sitting around eating pasta with the Hutchinson brothers. Not to mention, they couldn't gossip about the teachers if Dom, a teacher, was sitting right there. So he promised, he promised to humour them. That didn't mean he didn't want to see Brendan though.

Before he could explain all this to Brendan, Douglas approached him with a question about the dinner. He wanted to know what kind of clothes to wear, and Steven joked and said how he'd go in his pajamas if he could. He wanted to get back to talking to Brendan, but he needed Doug tonight, he could hardly ignore. Brendan wasn't happy though, not with him conversing with Doug whilst he was on the phone. Ste didn't have the patience to deal with scitzo Brendan, so he ignored Brendan's dig and told him why he couldn't meet him for lunch. The older boy didn't say anything for a while, and when Ste asked if he was still there, he sounded disappointed when he told Ste that he just had an hour to kill, he sounded like he was making excuses.

A knot tightened in Ste's gut. And when Rae and Amy approached him for their lunch together, he snapped at them. The girls were his friends, but it was their fault he couldn't go to the river. It was their fault Brendan sounded the way he did. When he managed to get rid of Rae and Amy he told Brendan he'd see him soon. Even if he couldn't see him today, he'd see him as soon as. After that, he hung up, hung up before Brendan could make a quip about not being that desperate to see the boy. He may not have been desperate, but Ste knew that he'd let him down.

Ste got home around four-ish. Joey made a joke about expecting him to have ended up at the hospital again, so Ste chucked on of his trainers at him. He showered and put on a dark shirt and jeans for the night. He might have told Doug to wear anything, but for the American that probably meant wearing an old pair of chinos instead of his best. He'd look ready for church no matter what he wore. Ste on the other hand, had to rummage through his entire wardrobe and dig out the shirt he wore when he used to only waiter for Tony at the restaurant.

When he came down, Joey was already ready and waiting. They talked about his day in school and how he made a complete mess of the kitchen, as they got the bus to the restaurant. It wasn't in Hollyoaks, but it wasn't too far from it either. People like Ste didn't eat at a place like Il Gnosh, they didn't drink at the pubs in the area, eat in the cafes, use the gyms. They didn't really venture into this end. Only time Ste came here was to work for Tony. He didn't even bother going into any of the shops or anything. Even if he did go into the bars, they wouldn't serve him. He looked far too young. The pub near his house may have because frankly they couldn't give a shit, but in a place like this, they'd care.

They got to the restaurant five on the dot and the place was empty. Well apart from Dom who was in everyday clothes behind the counter, laughing with Doug on the other side. Rae and Amy were sat at a table talking to Tony who was sitting with them, also wearing everyday clothes. It was strange seeing the brothers in something other than chef whites. Ste had told Amy and Rae that Doug was coming, so they didn't seem bothered by his presence. They didn't question him much about inviting him, they accepted it when he told them that Doug was a mate and he wanted him there. They looked like they wanted to know more, but Ste had changed the subject.

All attention turned to the Hay boys as they pushed the glass door open and entered the premises. Dom came out from behind the counter carrying a tray of beers and two glasses of rum and coke. He guessed those were for the girls. There was something strange about his teacher offering his underage students' alcohol.

"Sir, this has to be illegal, right?" Ste grinned at Dom, as he took a glass from the tray and sat around the table that was set up for seven people.

Dom asked if he would prefer an orange juice, and when Ste told him he had to be kidding, Dom sniggered.

As everyone settled around the table, Joey put his hand out to Doug to shake, "Doug, right?"

Doug looked a little worried; he must've forgotten that when he was invited out for dinner, he was invited out to spend the evening with a guy being accused of a horrible crime. He shook Joey's hand, gave him a smile and nodded.

"Come over and sit next to me and Ste." Joey stood up and made everyone shuffle one seat, so Doug could get in between. "I would say I've heard a lot about you, but not really. Ste's been quite hush hush."

Doug made a uneasy sound and told Joey that there wasn't much to tell. That all they pretty much did was drink and behave like pigs, eating junk food and swearing at each other when one of them killed the other on Call of Duty. The whole table laughed, and though Joey joined in, he didn't look completely convinced.

And then he started the interrogation, while everyone watched on silently.

"I didn't catch your surname."

"Carter."

"You're American."

"That' something I've noticed."

"When did you come to the UK?"

"Couple of years ago. My parents moved here after my dad got a job in Chester."

"You like it here?"

"I miss New York, but this place has become my home too."

"Found a girl to make you feel more at home?"

"I'm gay."

The silence following that was deathly. Joey didn't have a problem with gay people as far as Ste was aware. Every time Terry called Ste a faggot, Joey would tell him that the only insulting part of that comment, is when the person on the receiving end takes it as an insult. That a gay person doesn't act like someone kicked their balls in, when they assumed they were straight, so a straight person shouldn't act like being called gay was the end of the world.

Tony coughed into the silence, Dom looked at everyone's expression, and the girls hid their faces behind their glasses. Doug looked straight ahead at Joey, and that's when Ste noticed; Joey wasn't looking at Doug with some kind of homophobia, he was looking at him with curiosity. His eyes flicked over to Ste for a brief second, before looking at Doug again.

He smiled. Broadly. And it wasn't fake. "Really?" Joey looked like he had just found the final piece of a puzzle. Ste didn't know what the hell it meant. He patted Doug on the shoulder and said, "good for you, kid. It can be hard to be an out person in a place like Hollyoaks Sixth Form." Dom sat there on his side of the table, nodding away in agreement, whilst everyone else let out a breath of relief. They didn't know Joey's views on homosexuality, and they really didn't want to deal with Joey getting all homophobic.

Doug grinned back at Joey, told him that after coming out to his parents, it wasn't something he considered to be a secret. He was who he was. Joey agreed with him, couldn't agree more apparently.

Ste interrupted the bonding session by asking why the restaurant was closed, how Tony was too stingy to close just for a meal with a few kids. Tony laughed and told him to watch what he was saying, that he was still Ste's boss.

Joey piped in, "well, Tony and I have a surprise for you." He nodded towards Tony who got up and retrieved a few papers out from behind the counter. "Just in case I end up going prison -"

"Joey." Ste interrupted. He didn't want his brother thinking like that.

"No, wait. Lemme finish." He took the papers from Tony and placed them in front of Ste. It was an application for something. "Just in case I go to prison, I don't want you home alone with Dad." Ste looked around at the table to see everyone' reaction. They all knew about Terry, he didn't have to even tell Tony or Dom or Rae, they didn't have to be geniuses to know where Ste's bruises came from. The only person that didn't know was Doug. But he didn't look like he was judging Ste over it. Possibly he did know too, possibly he noticed the black eyes Ste sometimes walked around with. "You'll be eighteen in January, and I promised you I'd have you out of there, no matter what happened to me. So I asked Tony to call in a few favours. He called up a few culinary schools, and there's gonna be guys coming here to see you. To see how you good you are."

Amy spoke up, "and you're really good."

Then Dom, "well, you weren't that great in class today, but I'm gonna put that down to be an anomaly."

Ste laughed, he couldn't believe what he was hearing.

Joey carried on, "If you impress them, they're gonna give you a place in their school. You have to design your own, original menu and cook it for them. The application is just a formality. You'll be eighteen soon, so you won't even need Mum and Dad's permission. You'll be out of here."

"But you're not gonna go to prison." Ste was finding it hard to digest all the information. But he needed to put that across. That Joey was going to be here to see him go to school.

His older brother gave him a sad smile and said, "then fine, great. I won't go to prison. But you'll still have this. You're still outta here, little brother."

The school would pay for his classes because of his family's financial circumstances, and Joey saved up a little money that he was going to use anyway, to move out with Ste when he turned eighteen and their parents no longer had custody of him. Now the money would go towards Ste's accommodation, as the school wouldn't pay for that. And the rest of the money he would need for living expenses would be made up by Tony. Depending on which branch of the school Ste decided to go to, he could still work at Il Gnosh if he wanted to. Tony joked about how that way, he wouldn't just be giving money to Ste for free, but then he said how it would probably be better if he concentrated on his studies mainly, because culinary school was no walk in the park. Not to mention that if Ste thought Tony was a prick in the kitchen, he hadn't seen anything yet, because the teachers would skin him alive. Dom elbowed his older brother and scowled at him for trying to terrify Ste, but the only thing that scared Ste right about then, was the prospect that he really could leave this life behind.

Ste looked around, everyone was smiling at him.

"I - I - That doesn't explain why the restaurant is closed." That was the only thing he could think to say.

Tony laughed and told him that he closed the restaurant, so Ste could have the entire kitchen to himself, so this could be like a training session for him. He was to cook a three course meal for everyone. And when Ste pointed out his broken arm, Tony rolled his eyes.

"Ste, do you know the amount of times chefs cut themselves, burn themselves? They don't let that get in their way." Tony got up from his seat whilst Ste pointed out that a burn wasn't quite the same as having your bones smashed to pieces. The restaurant owner stood behind Amy and Rae and said, "well, every chef has his team in the kitchen." Then he placed a hand each on the girls' heads, while they both yelped. He said, "meet yours. And with Doug here, you have three pairs of hands."

Apparently Dom had enough of Ste in the kitchen, so he wouldn't be helping. Tony wanted his meal cooked for him, for once, rather than doing the cooking himself. And Joey just outright said he didn't want to help, because he didn't really want to.

They ended up making prawns with crispy chorizo for starters, Joey would eat anything, but Tony and Dom were pretty impressed. Ste's friends were already exhausted after making the started, so they ate like ravenous animals. For main Ste made Lemony pea and rocket risotto with salmon steaks. Yeah, yeah, Ste liked his seafood. And for desert, he made Crème Brûlée. It was kind of his favourite thing to make. Activity in the kitchen was a bit manic, and at one point Doug caught his knitted jumper on fire when he took it off from the heat of the kitchen. Tony was more worried about his restaurant than Doug, Dom ran about looking for the fire extinguisher, the girls shrieked, and Ste and Joey laughed. Neither of them was sad to see the jumper go up in flames.

After it was all over, all seven of them sat around the table and talked about nothing in particular. Doug was talking to Joey, they were quickly becoming friends. Dom and Rae were talking about modern music versus whatever the hell Dom listened to. And Amy, Tony and Ste were discussing possible ideas for the menu he was supposed to be coming up with. It was about nine in the evening when Amy and Rae said they had to go home. Tony said he had to clean up the mess Ste had made, and when Ste said he could stay to help, Tony told him that it was okay, he didn't have to. Dom wanted to go to bed, because he was an old fart.

So that left Ste, Joey and Doug standing outside the restaurant. Joey was letting the American borrow his jacket because he'd burnt his jumper, and as a show of gratitude Doug asked if he could say thanks by buying them a beer. Joey was up for it, but Ste wanted to see Brendan. It was only an hour or so later than their usual meeting time. Maybe he could still see the older boy.

He didn't say anything though, his brother had done something special for him, and he couldn't ditch him after that. Joey suggested a nearby pub that was visible from where they were standing. Ste passed it every time he came to work, but it was too posh looking to go in to. They wouldn't fit in. But Ste wasn't the only one looking apprehensive about going into the place. Doug looked like he could pass out from awkwardness. Joey grinned and told him not to worry, that he'd bring in the drinks, seeing as they probably wouldn't serve to Doug.

"It's not that." Doug played with the zip of the jacket that he borrowed from Joey; it was too big for him. "It's just. I've been there before." Course he had. Chinos had a home in a place like that. "And erm... Brendan Brady works there. You know, Cheryl's brother."

Joey grumbled something about not being able to get away from them anywhere, and Ste stood there. The ground beneath him splitting open. Making him feel like someone had ripped off a pair of rose tinted glasses from his eyes, and the reality of everything was disgusting and fake and a lie. One. Big. Lie.

It wasn't true. It was a coincidence that the Brendan that he'd come to enjoy spending time with, the Brendan he sort of looked up to, had the same name as Cheryl's brother. It was a coincidence. Nothing more.

Joey told Doug that maybe they could go out for that drink another time, prehaps when he returned Joey's jacket, or he could come along to one of his and Ste's game nights. If it was cool with them. Doug nodded and shook Joey's hand before heading in the opposite direction to them. Ste walked silently beside his brother, going over what he had just learned in his head. It couldn't be true, it just couldn't.

"You can go with him if you want." Joey said when Ste hadn't spoken at all.

"You what?" Ste didn't really know what Joey was saying, he was too busy feeling like he had been stabbed in the back multiple times.

"Doug. You can go hang out with him if you want. I know you'd rather be there, than at home." He smiled at Ste to show him that it was okay to leave him.

"You sure?" Ste asked, and when Joey nodded, he said, "I won't be back late, I just wanna tell him thanks for coming."

As Ste ran back the way they came, Joey shouted out, "I like him, y'know."

Ste smiled and nodded, and Joey went on his way home. Ste liked him too, but he was thinking about Doug. And even though he told Joey that he was going to go back to say thanks to Doug, he found himself standing in front of that posh looking pub. It was called, The Silver Moon. Ste didn't think Brendan told him the name of the pub he worked at, this could still be a different Brendan.

He didn't know how long he sat outside, but he couldn't get himself to go in. What if it wasn't a coincidence? Eventually, a girl came out to collect glasses; she had a short, tight dress on and shoes that were practically skyscrapers.

"You alright there?" She asked with a smile that was far too wide. She had dimples and Ste had to fight the urge to reach up and stick his finger in it.

"Yeah I was just looking for someone, but I'm not sure if they're in there."

She pulled out a chair and sat opposite him, "Well you'll never find out from sitting out here." She gave him a once over, and he was glad that he was wearing smart clothes; she didn't look like she interacted with boys in hoodies. "Who are you looking for?"

Here goes nothing. "Brendan." He swallowed. He played with the cuffs of his jacket. "He works here, right?"

"Yeah, I can get him for you if you want. Who shall I say is looking for him?"

Ste should've thought twice before he blurted out, "Ste Hay."

She knew who he was. She dropped her smile and cocked her head to a side, "and _you_ wanna see Brendan?"

When he nodded, she squinted her eyes and looked at him again, she looked at his broken arm, assessed how much of a threat he was, if she was to bring him down. Finally she sighed, stood up and told him to come wait inside. He followed her in, and Brendan was nowhere to be seen. Or maybe he was here, but it wasn't his Brendan.

_His_ Brendan? Fucking hell.

He settled himself down into a booth and she told him she'd go up to get him. So he wasn't at the bar. Shit shit shit.

The girl was taking her time, so Ste started playing with a loose strand on the bottom of his shirt while he waited, while he prayed.

But when he looked up and saw the girl standing there with a tall, dark haired boy, dressed in black, he knew that he had been fooling himself into thinking it was a coincidence. There was no denying that the Brendan he had come to call a mate; was Brendan _Brady_. Cheryl Brady's fucking brother.

He swallowed down his sense of betrayal and called out, "hiya Bren."

He wasn't going to let this guy know how hurt he was. Brendan stood there for a while, staring at him. Eventually he forced a smile onto his face, and Ste took that as his cue to approach the bar. He sat on a stool and put his best normal face on.

"I was in the area. You know, I told you about dinner with Tony. Well his restaurant is that Italian place across the street. I took a lucky guess and came in here. Asked her if you were here, and here you are." Ste was word vomiting, and the look on Brendan's face showed that. The girl next to him had an eyebrow raised, and looked between him and Brendan. Ste reached out a hand to the girl, and took an educated guess when he said, "you must be Anne."

She smiled at him and shook his hand, told him that people called her Mitzeee with three e's. And he joked about how it was typical of Brendan to call her one thing, while the world called her another. Told her about the older boy's insistence to call him Steven, instead of Ste. Her face showed that she was curious as to how Ste knew what was typical of her best friend. He ignored it and told her he recognised her name; he might've seen her in a magazine a couple of times. Brendan closed his eyes as Ste spoke to Mitzeee. He wasn't happy about Ste introducing himself to his friends. Mitzeee and him talked briefly about her magazine shoot anyway, it made her blush. Brendan on the other hand, still had yet to say anything, and his fists were tightening. He wasn't the only one to notice. Mitzeee looked down and instantly shut up.

Finally he turned and spoke to his friend, "Anne, give us a minute"

She looked like she didn't want to leave, like she had questions to ask Brendan, and Ste had a few of his own. Still, she left, but not before telling Brendan to come say bye before he headed home.

"I thought you wouldn't be able to come out tonight." Brendan said as he got Ste a glass of coke. Ste guessed serving Ste beer at the bar was a no no. "I was about to go home." He carried the coke with him, as he came round to Ste's side of the bar and led them to a booth.

"Yeah, but like I said, I was in the area. I felt bad about not coming out for lunch." Why wasn't Ste confronting him?

"Right. Well, you didn't need to feel bad. As you can see I was working, anyway. It's not the end of the world, Steven." Brendan pushed the glass of coke closer to Ste, silently telling him that the drink was for Ste.

He ignored the glass and stood up, "I should go." He didn't want to be around Brendan right now, he needed to process everything. He needed to figure out what his next step was. But Brendan gripped his arm, and when Ste looked down at where they made contact, the older boy let go.

"I'm finished now though, if you wanna hang out."

It was so fucking hard to hate Brendan. He was a liar, just like his sister. But a part of Ste still believed that Brendan Brady wasn't manipulating him. Wasn't making a fool out of him. Brendan didn't look like he felt any malice towards Ste. But that was why so many people believed Cheryl about the rape. These Bradys were expert liars.

"I should go, I have -"

"School in the morning, I know." He smiled at Ste and tugged on his sleeve to get him to sit down again. "Just lemme get my jacket, and we can leave. I won't keep you too long."

Ste nodded away like the fool he was as Brendan got out of the booth, and went through a door that Ste guessed led him to the house part of the pub. He sipped at his coke as he waited for Brendan, even though he knew he should run and never look back. Brendan didn't take too long, and when he came out, he had Mitzeee on his heels.

"Brendan, slow down." She called after him, but he was busy pulling Ste up and pushing him out the door. "Brendan, for god's sake!" Then the door shut on her, and Ste was being led by the elbow to some community garden.

Ste shrugged Brendan off, but the older boy didn't pay much attention. He found them a bench to sit on and perched himself down on it, waiting for Ste to join him. If Brendan could fuck with Ste, Ste could fuck with Brendan. Two could play this game. He sat himself down next the older boy who he was fast realizing, was even more of a stranger than he thought. Ste had to suck up his pride and act like he still thought Brendan was just a gate crasher, that he didn't know Brendan was using him. He had to, if he wanted to use Brendan too. If he said the right things, maybe Brendan would slip something to prove his sister was a liar. Just like him.

"So..." Brendan said when neither of them had spoken. "Are you okay? You look like someone stole your spatula."

Ste laughed. It wasn't real. Nobody stole his spatula, but Brendan Brady stole his trust. And that accent, it might not have been the same as Cheryl's, but it was still Irish. The baby sister he stayed for; everything was starting to make sense. How could Ste have been so stupid?

"No...Someone sent my brother clippings of rapists who had been butchered." He looked at Brendan to judge his reaction. He didn't give one. He had the stony face he always had when Joey was brought up. Ste knew why now. Brendan could've been the one to have delivered those clippings, he did know where they lived after all. "It's just shaken me up a bit."

Brendan smiled. Of course he did. He was glad to have made them scared. Ste pretended that the smile was evil, and not reassuring. "Nobody's gonna hurt you, Steven." Ste laughed and raised his broken arm. Brendan sighed, "nobody's gonna hurt you _again_."

It felt like a promise. A promise he could make, because he was behind the first attack? No. Brendan was out to get information about Joey, using this long arse method. The plan to meet up with Ste was made before the beating. If he wanted to get Steven beat up to scare his brother, he wouldn't have had to pretend to be Ste's friend. He could've just organised another attack, and if that didn't work, he could've organised another. He didn't have to torture himself by spending time with Ste.

But the blond cockney guy said they were waiting for Brendan.

For Ste's own sanity, he had to remember that Brendan wasn't there. That Brendan looked horrified by the state of him. He had to believe that Brendan had nothing to do with his attack.

"What makes you so sure?" Ste asked Brendan.

"If they do, they'll have to answer to me." He grinned at Ste, "I'm the only one that's allowed to be horrible to you."

Of course.

"Except by the time they can answer to you, they've already hurt us. Hurt me" Not to mention that the only person that was hurting him right now was Brendan.

"Steven –"

"Moving on," Ste had to stop him before he could lie anymore. Before he made Ste want to believe him so badly. "Mitzeee seems nice."

"Yeah, but she can be a right pain sometimes." He did that thing again, where he said something bad about her, but in a way that said he wouldn't have her any other way. At least Ste knew for a fact now, that Brendan never spoke about him like that. "How was your dinner with_ Douglas_?" He took a pause, "you look nice, by the way."

"It was good. Think I might hang out with him some more." Ste wanted to tell him about this chance he was getting to go to school, but it was something he would tell a friend. Brendan was his friend, this guy was a Brady.

Brendan hummed in response; there was an edge about him that made him come across like he didn't like Doug. Or maybe he didn't want Doug coming in and screwing up his plan.

"You've never mentioned him before." Ste still couldn't put his finger on what it was that made Brendan sound like he wanted to hunt Doug down, and eliminate his existence.

"Well I don't mention you to anyone, doesn't mean you don't exist. By the look on Mitzeee's face, you haven't mentioned me to her, I still exist."

"I get your point, Steven." He snapped his head round to look at Ste, to get him to shut up. He was going to be in deep shit when Mitzeee asked him about Ste. That made him happy, that Brendan knew what he was doing, was fucking obnoxious.

They sat there in silence for a while before Ste got up and told Brendan he was leaving, that now that he's back in college, he couldn't stay out late, and Joey was expecting him home. In reality he didn't want to be near Brendan, not right now, he needed to process what he had just learned. What his next move was. He wanted to use Brendan, manipulate him, and give Brendan a taste of his own medicine. But being around him was slightly suffocating, and Ste didn't know if he wanted to fight for survival, or let himself just be asphyxiated by the presence of Brendan.

The older boy asked him to stay a little longer, told him that it wasn't even that late. But Ste walked away, all the while Brendan was calling after him. When his body felt the urge to turn back, he picked up his pace and ran.

Xxx

Ste didn't have college till the afternoon, so when his phone alarm woke him up at seven thirty am; he chucked the thing across the room. The alarm had woken Joey up too, and the older boy asked him if he was okay. He asked the same thing when he had come home the previous night, way earlier than Joey was expecting him. Ste had gone to bed straight away, telling Joey he was just tired because he hardly had any sleep the previous night. Joey probably didn't believe him, but when Ste pulled the duvet over his head, he let it go.

Brendan had texted him a couple of times, told him that if he really was scared about the clippings, he could talk to Brendan. Why would Ste give him that satisfaction, when Brendan was probably behind it? Ste had deleted all his messages from Brendan, but he couldn't get himself to delete the number. Anyway, he needed it if he was to use Brendan, the way Brendan was using him.

Ste ignored his older brother and went back to sleep, and it was eleven thirty when his phone alarm was going off again. It was across the room this time, so he had to get up to turn it off again. He would've gone back to bed, if Joey hadn't stopped him and told him he better get his arse to college. He went, didn't say much to anyone that day. Amy and Rae were still squealing about all the things he could cook for the school staff that were coming to judge his cooking. And at one point he caught up with Doug to say thanks for the previous night. Doug handed over Joey's jacket, and Ste stuffed it in his rucksack. The day was pretty uneventful.

When he went home he watched the telly until Terry took over the remote, then he went upstairs and tried to come up with a menu of his own, one that had never made before. He ignored Joey when he asked what was up with him, and when Joey snatched away the notebook he was writing in, he threw a flimsy left handed punch at his brother. It only just hit his jaw, and Ste was pretty sure it was painless, but he felt guilty instantly.

"What the fuck, Ste? What's wrong with you?"

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hit. I didn't even realise." It was true, he may have been scribbling in his notebook, but it was Brendan his thoughts were with. Brendan and his stupid lies. And when Ste swung for Joey, he was actually hitting Brendan. He was hitting him for making Ste still want to see him, no matter what Brendan had done.

Joey sighed, "it's okay. Ste, you've barely said a word since last night, tell me what's wrong."

Ste wanted to. But how was he supposed to tell Joey that he thought he'd found a new friend, a friend that was his very own. But it turned out that he was just using Ste to get to Joey. Ste told his brother he was just tired, that all those late nights were catching up with him. He climbed into bed and forced himself to sleep. That way he didn't need to think about Brendan, and he didn't need to force himself to not open the text messages he was getting from him.

Xxx

It was nine o'clock Friday evening, and Ste was completely drunk on cider. The day had gone pretty much the same way as the previous night had, but this time on his way home, he managed to score some alcohol. Joey had given up for the night in trying to get Ste to talk, and had gone out with his mates. Terry and his mum had gone to the pub and Ste was left alone at home, watching The Italian Job on Film4, and drowning his thoughts away. He wasn't paying much attention to the movie, and when his phone rang, he didn't need to look at it to know that it was the very person that was distracting him from the film.

Brendan had only sent him a few texts last night, but now Ste's phone continued to ring and ring and ring, until he couldn't take it anymore. If he had much sense, he would've switched the phone off

"What do you want, Brendan?" His words were a little slurred

"Are you drunk?" Brendan asked straightaway. Okay, his words were a lot slurred.

"So what if I am?"

Brendan sighed on the other end, "come outside. I'm by your estate in -"

"I don't think so, Brendan." Ste didn't want to see him; he didn't want to hear anymore of Brendan's deceit.

"Steven, if you don't come out, I'm coming in." Ste knew he wouldn't. His cover would be blown if he came in and Joey came home. Brendan wouldn't be able to hold his anger in if he was face to face with the guy he thought raped his sister.

But Ste still found himself saying, "fine."

Brendan was in that car he had borrowed off his friend the time they went to Liverpool. Ste couldn't think the Brendan from that day, to be the same Brendan he was in the car with now. Brendan didn't drive them anywhere. They just sat in the car by his estate.

"Are you gonna tell me what's up with you? You haven't replied to any of my texts, and right now, you look like you're about to cry." Brendan had an eyebrow raised at him. When Ste didn't answer, he got frustrated, "Steven, for fuck's sake, tell me what's wrong?!"

And Ste didn't know what he was doing when he was started punching Brendan on his arm. It wasn't hurting the older boy, and he couldn't throw very good punches with his left arm, but he was letting his frustration out. It wasn't fair. If he really believed Joey to have attacked his sister, why did he have to involve Ste? And if he had to do that, why couldn't he have just turned up when the cockney guy said he would? Why did he have to do this?

Brendan managed to open his seat belt and turn in his seat to stop the punches, but Ste still struggled to get more in there. Brendan gripped Ste's face hard with both hands, and forced him to look at Brendan in the eye, properly for the first time in days. Ste had to breathe heavily to stop the sting of tears behind his eyes. Brendan looked angry, pissed off as hell, but he also looked like he was worried, like he cared. That annoyed Ste more.

"Steven, Jesus." Brendan said when Ste struggled to get loose, but Brendan held on. "Tell me what's up with you."

"I'm scared." It came out of his mouth without thinking, and it was the god honest truth.

"What about? About me? I'm not gonna hurt you, Steven. I would've already done that, if that was my big idea." He looked like he meant it, but he _was_ hurting Ste.

Ste didn't say anything, just stared at those blue eyes that were so full of secrets. At least he knew one now. But once Ste started looking at those eyes, he couldn't stop. And Brendan wasn't backing away, he wasn't letting Ste go; he was looking right back. He didn't know how long they did that for, and he didn't know when his face started getting closer to Brendan's. Ste swallowed and watched as Brendan's eyes drifted down to his neck to watch the movement of his adam's apple. Their eyes met again once his lips were only an inch away from the older boy's, Ste glanced at them before he shut his eyes and closed that inch.

And everything made sense. The feeling in his stomach that was ever present when he was around Brendan, jumped up into his throat, and Ste knew what it was. His brain shut down, it didn't hurt , his mum, Joey, Cheryl, Brendan's betrayal, none of it mattered. The only thing his brain could take in was the softness of Brendan's lips against his. Brendan's hand tightening on his face, nails digging into his skin. And when Ste opened his mouth and slid his tongue into Brendan's mouth, the sweetness of the older boy's tongue sent an electric wave through Ste's body, and ended in his groin.

The kiss barely lasted a second, in his head time had just slowed down. In reality, the kiss was cut off by Brendan just as their tongues touched. He shoved Ste away from him, and Ste's back collided hard against the car door. He thought Brendan was going hit him. His face spilled out fury, and he had a hand up to wipe his offended lips. He couldn't believe what Ste had just done. Ste couldn't believe what he had just done.

"What..." He couldn't even get a whole sentence out because of his anger. "What do you think you're doing, Steven?"

Ste didn't know how to answer. He'd never done anything like that before. "I- I just..." He didn't finish the sentence. He didn't know what to say. "I'm sorry."

"Get out." Brendan ordered. And when Ste didn't move, he shouted, "Now! Get out!"

"I'm going." Ste mumbled as he panicked and struggled to get the car door open. When he finally managed to get out, he didn't look back as he ran back into his house. He didn't check to see if Brendan had driven off straight away, or if he had waited.

Ste walked into the bathroom and washed his face with cold water before looking up at the mirror, at his reflection. He still looked the same, but he didn't feel it.

What the fuck did he just do?


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

"You know, you're making the bar unapproachable. And if people can't come up here, they can't buy the drinks they came in here for."

Rhys finally developed the balls to approach Brendan who was stood in the doorway, behind the bar that led to the house, his head leaning against the frame and his arms crossed. He hadn't moved from that position for a while, just stared moodily at the patrons, and if anyone asked him for a drink, he'd move at a snails pace to get it for them. He had a headache, and anyone who made eye contact with him, made him feel like they were dancing on his last nerve. Rhys speaking to him, when all he really wanted to do was go home, made him turn around and snarl at the other barman.

"If I wanted to hear from an arse, Rhys, I'd fart." He knew his eyes were bloodshot from his lack of sleep, and that when he bared his teeth the way he did, he looked almost animalistic. But Rhys's voice was sounding like cat's being shredded by a lawn mower, and he really wanted to be left alone.

He was lucky that Anne had gone to London for the weekend for some photo-shoot or something, so he didn't have to deal with her inane questioning as to why he had a face that looked like a pit-bull terrier's smacked arse. Ever since Steven's little appearance in the pub, she'd been continuously questioning him about the boy. Why was he looking for Brendan? How comes he calls Brendan, Bren, like they know each other, like they're friends? What was he up to with the boy? How comes Steven knows so much about Brendan? Was the kid's broken arm anything to do with him? He better not try to hurt that sweet little thing.

Sweet little thing?

Sweet little things didn't make people feel like they wanted to get an electric drill, and pierce it through their skull and into their brain. Just so they could fuck up everything in there, and that way they'd understand why they had fucked up thoughts about said sweet little thing. Then Brendan would have an excuse for feeling the way he did; if he had screwed up brains, it'd make sense for him to have screwed up thoughts.

Rhys moved away from him, mumbling under his breath about how he couldn't believe he was working with a psycho. If Brendan had any energy in him, he'd have asked the guy to repeat himself, then he'd have tried to make him swallow his own tongue. Not tonight though. It was Sunday, and all he really wanted to do was go home with a bottle of Jameson's.

Despite the fact that he was glad Anne was gone and he didn't have to deal with her new found interest in Steven Hay, he sort of missed her. He needed her yapping to drown out the buzzing in his head; he'd even listen to her moan about Riley Costello, if it meant he wasn't left alone with his thoughts. When he went home, that's what the whisky was for. To keep him occupied with something other than the boy with blue eye and his petal soft lips.

Urgh, he needed to get a grip. Petal soft lips? He wasn't supposed to remember that. But he always knew though, didn't he? That the boy would have lips like that. From the moment he saw him standing at his front door, he knew that the boy's lips could put a rose petal to shame. He remembered what he thought of those lashes and those eyes, and he remembered how his gaze had travelled down to the boy's lips. Even back then, he scolded himself for thinking about them, for wondering about them. But now he couldn't get them out of his mind.

When Steven had turned up at the pub, he thought he was screwed. He thought someone would recognise him and ask why Steven Hay was here. Then he'd wonder what the big deal was and someone would tell him who Brendan really was. Or Anne, he was afraid Anne would ask Steven why he was acting like mates with Brendan Brady. But she hadn't. That girl always had more brains than he gave her credit for. She had kept her mouth closed in front of Steven, even though he could tell she had endless questions running around in her head.

He had to fist his hands to prevent himself from climbing over the bar and dragging Ste away from her. They were talking about Anne's photo-shoot, but it was still making him anxious. He was too close to Steven finding out who he was. It was all too close to reality. In the middle of the night, what they had was almost illusory, and when he invited Steven to have lunch with him by the river, it was okay because the water and the trees were in on the secret. He could tell himself it wasn't real. The words they spoke, the sounds they made when they laughed; all of it would remain in the night, lost in the leaves, drifted away by the river. Then Brendan would come home before the sun rose, he'd come home and the sunlight would expose him for everything that he was. He wasn't just plain ol' Brendan anymore. He was Brendan Brady again. And the thoughts of Steven that he had, would remain in his head; he'd never even utter the name. He would go back to being big bad Brady.

But two worlds were colliding when Steven started talking to Anne. Anne would ask about him, and Steven would no longer be his escape from reality. It was ironic how he needed to manipulate Steven to make his reality something better. Instead he manipulated his reality; he didn't speak of Cheryl or what Steven's brother did, because by a twist of fate, Steven was his something better.

The day after Steven's visit, Brendan came to work exactly when his shift started, and he left exactly when it ended. He never hung about to allow Anne to get enough alone time with him to actually interrogate him. He could tell she was getting frustrated, and he could tell that soon enough she wouldn't care who she asked in front of. She'd ask what he was doing with Steven in front of someone, and he'd have to drag her away to somewhere private. She'd get exactly what she wanted. Whenever Anne asked him something, he'd tell her he was a little a busy. Even when he wasn't, he pretended to be. She called him a few times when he was at home, but he'd ignored it. At one point he was afraid, she'd come to his house again, but the thought must've slipped her mind.

On Friday Anne had gone to London for her photo-shoot, but not before leaving him a voicemail:

_"Brendan Brady, I swear to god, if you carry on ignoring me when I get back from London, I'm going to rip your head off. I'm back Sunday night, so I won't see you till Monday. You better get your story straight, and that story better be the truth. I know when you lie. You know as well as I do that I have been easy on you so far, I was going to come to your house before I left, but I wanted you to come to me...Look, I gotta go... Just... Just don't hurt him. ..Bye."_

He was glad she wasn't here on Friday, his head was such a mess, he could've said everything and anything. His head had been a wreck since Steven showed up on the Wednesday evening. The boy had been acting weird, like after he'd seen Brendan, he couldn't wait to leave. Brendan had internally rebuked himself for asking the boy to stay more than once, for calling after him when he walked away. He was beginning to sound like he was dependent on Steven, when the plan was to make Steven dependant on him. Brendan didn't stop there though, he texted the boy after he had left, because he knew something was bugging him, and he wanted to help. He wanted to be there for him, and he didn't even know why.

Steven had told him something about article clippings, but he didn't know anything about that. Brendan put it down to being stupid kids who had nothing better to do with their day, and if it didn't scare Steven as well as Joseph, he'd probably have had high fived the kids. But it did scare Steven, and that meant he wanted to track them down and hammer their heads with a wrench. Yet, Brendan could tell that wasn't the only thing bothering the boy. He had told him about the clippings as an excuse, told Brendan something small that was bothering him, so Brendan would be blind to the larger problem. He wasn't blind to it. Maybe a little short sighted. He knew there was something there, it was just blurry and he wasn't sure what it was. But there was something else. Brendan had used that tactic since he was a child.

Then Steven had refused to answer any of his texts on the Thursday, and Anne kept asking him why he was continuously checking his phone. When the boy refused to reply to any of his texts on Friday too - and he didn't need Anne around to ask him about constantly checking his phone, he knew he was acting pathetic - he borrowed Warren's car and drove to Steven's place. He couldn't have walked there; he had planned to tell the boy that he wasn't going to move unless Steven came out. If anyone recognised him and saw him hanging around the Hay's estate, they'd probably call the cops. He needed to see the boy was okay, and he couldn't do that from a prison cell.

A part of Brendan had thought that Danny had got to him again, that because the first attack didn't work, he attempted round two. But Steven answered his phone after at least ten minutes of Brendan constantly calling. He sounded drunk, and he sounded angry, a type of anger that was hiding something else. Brendan began to panic that someone had let it slip in regards to who he was. That in the two seconds he left Steven alone in the pub to retrieve his jacket, and shrug off a curious Anne, someone had told him who Brendan really was. And that was why he was ignoring Brendan.

And that was why he was telling Steven that if the boy didn't come out, he'd go in. If Steven really did know who he was, the boy wouldn't risk his brother finding out that he was getting friendly with the enemy. Steven begrudgingly agreed, and Brendan didn't know whether to sigh in relief because he didn't have to go into that house, and Steven was agreeing to see him, or hold his breath because it might've meant that Steven knew and he didn't want Brendan, the lying scumbag, in his home.

He had seen the boy coming out of his house, slightly tipsy on his feet. Brendan flashed his headlights to signal where he was and the light allowed him to see Steven a little clearer. The boy was wearing a pair of grey Tracksuit bottoms that hung low on his hip and a white polo T-shirt, he topped off his look with a sulk. Brendan compared his appearance to the last time he had seen Steven, when he was wearing a dark shirt and smart pants. He only ever saw the boy in casual ware, and he couldn't help admiring how good the boy had looked cleaned up. He still preferred him in tracksuits. though.

When Steven reached the car he had pulled at the handle, realising it was locked, he slapped the window hard. Anyone else and Brendan would've got out of the car and punched them, but instead he had unlocked the door and watched as Steven climbed in. Then he slammed the door shut.

"Brendan." That wasn't Steven's voice. He turned his head to look at the person whose voice penetrated through his thoughts. It was Katy. "Brendan, go home." He frowned at her in confusion, he had at least an hour or two of his shift left. "You look a mess, and normally your handsome face gets me customers, but today you're just scaring them away." She looked at him with concern, and he knew she wanted to ask if it was anything to do with Cheryl, but he was never too good with talking about that.

Brendan looked over her shoulder and saw Rhys pulling a pint for some old guy, whilst looking at Brendan from the corner of his eyes. He had told on him to Katy, because Brendan had been rude to him. What was this, primary school? Brendan gave him a pissed off look, but he didn't bother arguing with anyone. He wanted to go home, anyway. He mumbled something to Katy before going to the back and getting his leather jacket. As soon as he stepped foot outside, the cold air hit him across the face. It was nearly October and Chester was getting cold way too fast. But he preferred the cold. He preferred the dark, he had always felt too exposed when the days lasted for what felt like forever.

On his walk home he connected his earphones to his phone and blocked his ears and thoughts out. He played Johnny Cash at its loudest volume, till he couldn't even hear the words and it was just noise. Noise was better than the havoc in his head.

Brendan walked through his front door and came face to face with his father who had his jacket on and was getting ready to go out. Seamus looked at him up and down, and Brendan had to resist the urge to wrap his jacket tighter around his body. Seamus waited till Brendan popped his ear phones out before he spoke. Just his father's presence made his hair stand on end, the man's voice had him feeling like an eight year old boy who just wanted to run until his legs gave in.

"You're home early." Seamus said as he stood in front of Brendan with his hand in his pockets.

"Katy sent me home. I wasn't feeling too well." He looked at his shoes as he spoke. His father had the ability to make him feel like the tiniest person alive, despite having several inches on the older man.

"What's wrong with you? Brenda caught the sniffles?" Seamus sneered at him, and Brendan still refused to look up. "Look at me when I'm talking to you, boy." He didn't raise his voice, he was good at that. Keeping calm and collected while his words were dripping with the promise of danger.

Brendan had to force himself to look up, what if Seamus could see. See what had happened only a few days before.

"What are you going to do about that Hay?"

Brendan panicked. Seamus knew. He knew what Steven did, and now he was going to make Brendan teach the boy a lesson for doing what he did. He was going to make Brendan hurt the lad to make him understand that Brady's were no queers.

"What..." Brendan's voice shook a little. "What do you mean, dad?"

"Joseph Hay. I hear he's still got both legs functioning." Seamus was talking about Joseph, not Steven.

Brendan slowly let out the breath he was holding. Seamus didn't know anything. "I'm working on it, dad."

His father made a sceptical humming sound before he walked up close to Brendan. Stood only a foot or so away from him before he reached his hand up. Brendan's heart thudded in his chest. It hit hard against his ribs, and he could feel it send a vibration through the rest of his body, it made every single one of his bones rattle. Seamus placed the back of his hand to Brendan's forehead.

He was checking his temperature. That was it.

Breathe Brendan, fucking breathe!

"You're not burning up too much. Get some whisky in you; it'll knock it right out." He took his hand down and walked around Brendan to the door.

"Yes, dad." Brendan said as he heard the front door close.

There was a cluttering sound and when Brendan looked down; his keys had slipped out of his hand. He opened up his palms and looked at them, stared at them. In the short time he had spoken to his father, his hands became clammy and sweat had made them slippery. He was nearly twenty two years old, he was much larger than his father, and the man had become old, but Brendan was still that little boy whenever he was in the presence of Seamus Brady.

Brendan picked up his keys and went up the stairs to check on his sister. He gave her a brief hello and she didn't even notice that he was home early. After that, he went back down, grabbed his towel; back up the stairs and into the bathroom. He turned the shower on before he had even stripped of his clothes to heat it up. He put the thing on full force, so when he climbed in, the pressure was heavy against his flesh. He turned his face up and let the water pound into his skin, let it beat down on him till it hurt. He turned around, so his back could get the same treatment, and when he braced his hands against the glass casing of the shower and closed his eyes, Steven Hay still managed to make his way into his mind.

Steven had closed the car with a slam and looked out into the dark through the windshield. Brendan hadn't driven them anywhere, he had wanted to make Steven feel safe, and if his house was right there, he could run to it if he felt the need. Brendan kept the doors unlocked. Neither of them had said anything for a while, until the tension in the car felt like smoke surrounding them, getting into his lungs and making them burn with every breath he took.

Brendan had asked what was up with him, and mentioned how he looked like he was about to cry. He hadn't even realised till he said it that, that was exactly how the boy appeared. Like if Brendan told him his hair looked a little dodgy, that would be it, he would break down. He looked at the boy expectantly and with raised eyebrows, because he couldn't let him know that Brendan needed to know what was going on with him. He had to look like he was just a little put out by Steven's mood swings, he had to. It was either that, or let his paranoia about the boy's knowledge of him become apparent on his face. When Steven didn't answer, he asked again, this time genuinely frustrated. He was going to go crazy otherwise.

It had been Steven that went crazy. He had started lashing out, punching him. It didn't hurt, but Steven wasn't stopping. He had the type of concentration on his face that only occurred when someone was trying to hold on to their anger, but it was fast fading and just left them exhausted. Brendan eventually managed to turn in his seat and get a hold of Steven, but still he fidgeted trying to get loose. Trying to hurt Brendan. Brendan had held on to his face and forced the younger lad to look at him, properly in his eyes. Steven's were slightly red, like he was struggling to keep his tears from falling, and Brendan wanted to hold him close. Tuck the younger boy's head under his chin and tell him whatever it was, it was going to be okay.

If Steven knew, he wanted to apologise.

And then Steven had told him he was scared.

Scared of what? When Brendan asked him if he was scared of him, he was praying that the boy's answer would be no. It had never been his intention to make the boy frightened of him. If he answered yes, then that would answer Brendan's question as to whether Steven knew. He had promised the boy he wasn't going to hurt him. Brendan just hoped he was telling the truth.

Steven hadn't replied to him. He just searched Brendan's eyes, like he could figure out if Brendan was lying if he looked at them hard enough. And Brendan should've looked away. The boy was already too good at reading him, at assessing him. He shouldn't have stared right back. He shouldn't have allowed himself to feel like he could swim in Steven's blue eyes. And he should've backed away when Steven's face started getting closer.

But a part of him wanted it.

He wanted those eyes to get closer, so he could get lost in them, so he could leave all this behind. And as the boy swallowed his nerves down, Brendan couldn't stop himself from letting his eyes drift and stare at the hypnotic way the boy's Adam's apple had moved in his throat. The way the skin stretched over it, and the way he wanted to close his mouth over the thing and feel it do the same movement beneath his tongue.

What the fuck was he thinking?

He looked back up to meet the boy's eyes and they were even closer than before. Everything in him had screamed to push the boy away, to get him out of the car and drive away, until thoughts of tongues on Adam's apples were a distant memory. One that he could convince himself wasn't real.

But everything shut up when he felt something so soft, it made his toes curl, against his lips. If he hadn't felt Steven's lashes sweep against his skin, he would have believed that this was impossible, that this type of softness didn't exist. He was wrong when he thought the boy had petal soft lips, they were the closest thing to it, but even that failed in comparison. It wasn't the dark, or the river, or the tree, or anything else that made their time surreal. It was Steven. Steven just wasn't something that could possibly exist in a world that was so cruel.

The boy's lips started moving beneath his own, and Brendan hadn't even realised that he had closed his own eyes. That he was savouring the touch as much as Steven. His hands tightened around the boy's face, and just for a second, he held on to him and thought about how he didn't want to let him go. He had held on so tight that he knew his nails were digging into Steven's flesh. Good. Let him bleed. Let him know that with Brendan came way more pain, than pleasure. Let him feel the destruction that Brendan was capable of, let him know how he could take something as flawless as Steven Hay, and shred it. Let him run away.

But he didn't.

Steven opened his mouth and invited more. He felt the boy's tongue sweep against his and with it came the realisation of what he was doing. Of what he was _thinking_. He wanted Steven's tongue against his own, he wanted to suck the sweetness right off it. But that wasn't right. He wasn't a queer.

So he shoved Steven away from him. Hard. The boy's back had smacked against the door and he looked a little terrified. Like he wasn't sure what had just happened either.

Brendan had a hand up to his lips; they were still tingling from the boy's touch, so he wiped them, trying to rub the sensation off. He couldn't, and the futility of his actions had built up a sense of anger inside of him. He wasn't a faggot. He shouldn't have felt like that. He was a Brady and Brady men... They... They didn't... They'd beat the crap out of Steven right now.

He asked the boy what he thought he was doing, because he needed him to deny it. Tell him that nothing had just happened. That Brendan's mind was playing tricks. But then that would've been just as bad, right? That he was thinking about Steven kissing him, when in reality Steven was just sitting there. The boy didn't deny it; he stuttered and stumbled over his words. He apologised and there was no saying it didn't happen after that. Steven had kissed him.

He told the boy to get out of his car, he needed him gone. He needed him out of his vicinity before he lashed out and did something he'd regret. He promised he'd never hurt the boy, a promise he intended to keep at least in the physical manner. So Steven Hay needed to be gone before he could grab the boy by the throat, and demand Steven make him understand what it was that he was doing to him.

The boy didn't hang about. He got out of the car and ran home without looking back. Just like he would have done eventually, anyway. At least this meant that Ste didn't know who Brendan really was.

Brendan opened his eyes and he wasn't in that car anymore, he was still in his shower, the water still pounding onto his back, and after a weekend with no contact with Steven, the boy was still in his head. And when Brendan looked down, it wasn't the head attached to his neck that was the only thing bothered by the blue eyed boy. He stood up straight and shampooed his hair, tried to force himself not to think about him, and kept his hand well away from _there._

When the thing wouldn't go down, he punched the glass wall of the shower. It didn't shatter, but it made his knuckles hurt. It did the job of distracting him. He climbed out, grabbed the towel and wrapped it around his waist, wasn't even bothered to dry himself. Then he went down and got the whisky out of the top kitchen cupboard, before heading to his room and settling down on his bed. He'd drink it all away, and eventually he'd fall asleep. When he woke up, he'd go to work and repeat the cycle. He'd repeat it till he didn't need the alcohol to forget Steven Hay.

He had watched Steven slam his front door shut that night, and then he'd driven to The Loft, parked Warren's car and entered the place with every intention to get laid. By a woman. He didn't have it in him, though. It wasn't because he was gay, it wasn't, he wasn't, he just didn't want to deal with the process of having to deal with some girl's irritating chatter before he could have her down on her knees. Instead he drank himself numb and tumbled home when the club came to its closing time. His house was right across from the place, so he didn't have to worry about driving home drunk. Once he was in, he fell asleep on the sofa. He did that the next night after work, and now he was keeping the party in his room. It was easier than having those minutes in between the club and his house, when he didn't have anything to distract him from allowing his thoughts to stray.

At least here he wouldn't get kicked out, and he could literally allow the alcohol to knock him out. The drink made him fall into a deep kind of sleep, the dreamless type. He was too afraid of what he'd see. It used to be Seamus that haunted his subconscious mind, but he had no doubt that those dreams would be replaced by something way more dangerous.

When Brendan woke up the next day it was with yet another hangover. He looked at his bedside table, and when he saw that he was running late, he ripped the covers off him and changed into the nearest thing he could find. He ignored Cheryl when she came up to him with a cup of coffee, and told her he was running late. When he got to the pub, Katy was a little surprised to see him. Did he miss something? Did his frown from last night mean he was fired?

"What are you doing here?" Katy asked him as he was hanging up his jacket.

"Erm... Unless I've missed something, I'm here to work." Brendan told her, slightly confused as to what was going on.

"Anne said you wanted today off." The Silver Moon landlady was looking at him like it was obvious. Like her niece hadn't just asked her to give him a day off without his knowledge.

He was about to tell the older woman that, actually he had no idea what she was going on about, and how he'd prefer to work. Except, Anne came down the stairs in scarlet red heels, the length of a small tower, wearing a black dress that he was sure would be just a top to a normal sized person. As she reached the bottom of the stairs, she grabbed the mac jacket she had hanging at the end of the banister.

She gave him a wide, dimpled grin. "We're going shopping."

"Like hell we are!" Brendan responded before the final word had even left Anne's mouth. "If I've got the day off, then I'm going home, sweetheart."

Katy rolled her eyes and headed back out to the bar, leaving Anne looking with raised eyebrows raised, at a scowling Brendan.

"Good," she said. "That's our first stop. We can't go to the car dealer's with you looking like you're going to pull a gun out of your back pocket and shoot everyone, just because it's Monday and by the looks of it, have a massive hangover."

She grabbed his arm, and he just about managed to retrieve his jacket as she dragged him out of the back door. She didn't ask him anything about Steven during the walk back to his flat, and he was glad because he wasn't so sure what he'd tell her, he wasn't sure if he could keep his mouth shut. Steven had messed up his head, and it felt like the only way to make sense of anything was to have someone else do it for him. Tell him what was wrong with him.

Instead she spoke about her trip to London, and about how this could be her lucky break, he was only half listening. He was relieved that it seemed like the London trip had made her forget about Steven appearing at the pub, looking for him. If she wasn't asking him anything, there wasn't a risk of him saying anything. By the time they climbed the stairs outside of his flat and were outside of his door, she had filled him up about her whole weekend.

Brendan gave her the response she wanted, that he was excited for her, as he opened his front door and found Lynsey sitting on the sofa with Cheryl, eating popcorn and watching cartoons. They both offered him a smile, and Cheryl's one even stayed on her face when she saw Anne behind him.

"Hello girls, how you both doing?" Anne greeted them as she walked over the threshold.

The girls mumbled something with a mouthful of popcorn each, he couldn't really understand them, but Anne nodded away like mumbling was her mother tongue. She joined them on the sofa and took a fistful of some popcorn herself. When his sister and her best friend swallowed down, they turned their attention to Brendan, wanted to know why he wasn't at work. Brendan glanced at Anne, she could probably answer the question better than he could, but he had lost her interest to SpongeBob Square Pants. He rolled his eyes at the three girls who were all too old to be watching this crap.

"Apparently I have the day off." He chucked his keys on the table, bringing Anne's attention back on him. "Anne wants to buy a car."

Anne stood back up and walked over to him, she still had her mac jacket on, but she was beginning to take it off. She threw the thing on the other sofa, the unoccupied one, and put her hands on her hips, whilst her eyes travelled the length of Brendan. From the top of his head, to the tip of his shoes.

"I don't want to buy a car; I don't have the cash for that." She let her hands drop from her hips, "we're going to find you a car." Then she grabbed Brendan's hand and dragged him off to his bedroom.

The girl had to stop inviting herself in here. She pushed him down, so he was sitting, before opening up his wardrobe. He protested, but a glare from her had him shutting up. She went through each item of his clothing, commentating on every piece. At one point she got all exasperated and asked him if he had anything that wasn't black, grey or a dark navy. He pointed out that he had a few white T-shirts, but she wasn't too impressed by it.

"Why do I need to dress up to go to the car dealer's, anyway? And since when was I buying a car?" He asked when he couldn't get his head round what Anne was up to.

She was still searching through his wardrobe as she spoke to him, "you have to be sophisticated if you want the sales person to take you seriously. I know you Brendan; you wouldn't buy any of that second crap. You always want the best of the best." She finally got a pale blue shirt with double collars out of the wardrobe and looked at it thoughtfully, before pulling Brendan up to place it against him, so she could see how he'd look in it. Then she placed it on the bed and carried on searching. Brendan sat back down. "As for the, 'since when was I buying a car', you sold your one because you thought you were off to Uni this year. Something about students and cars not mixing. But you're not gone." She got out a black suit and turned to look at him. "How long are you going to drive Warren Fox's car around. You really want that fatty to have that much control over your car usage." She leaned down and positioned her face close to his. "You, the control freak, has to borrow a car off his friend, not being able to decide when you can just pop in and drive far, far away."

Brendan put his hand on Anne's face and pushed it away from him, "okay, you made your point, Minniver." She giggled as she lost her balance the tiniest bit, and Brendan had to reach out and steady her before she fell. He stood up and took the suit off her, "what makes you think I can even afford the type of car that is only sold in places you have to wear a suit to?"

Anne cocked her head to a side and looked at him in a way that told him, that she very well did know he had the money to afford such a car.

When she told him to strip, and he told her to get out, she simply turned around, so that her back was to him and repeated her instruction. There was no point fighting her on this. He stripped. First he took his sweater off and put the shirt on, but he didn't button it before he took off his jeans and put on the black slacks. He was zipping them up when Anne started speaking again.

"Why do you do it?"

"Do what?" Please don't be anything about Steven. Please don't be anything about Steven. Please -

"The drugs? Why do you sell them?" She turned to look at him then.

Brendan's hand had frozen half way whilst buttoning up his shirt. "What do you mean?"

She walked up to him and shrugged his hand away, so she could continue doing the buttons for him. He knew it was her way of avoiding eye contact in case she had crossed the line and pissed him off. "It's not like you have kids and no other way of providing for them. And you have a decent job at the pub. What's your reason for selling the drugs?"

She had reached the top of his shirt, and left only the one button at the throat open. He swatted her hands away, closed the wardrobe door that she had left open, and looked at his image in the full length mirror attached to the door. "I started when I was about eighteen. I needed enough money to get out of here, so I'd never have to look back. I'd go to Uni, get my degree, and I wouldn't have to wait around before I could buy my own business." He tucked his shirt into his pants and unbuttoned two more buttons at the top. "I needed a lot of money, and I needed it fast. But then Maggie got ill and..." He turned to look at his friend, "once you're in that game, you can never really get out. They don't let you."

"Who are _they_?"

Danny Houston. "Nobody."

He gave her a reassuring smile that she didn't believe, and picked up the jacket from the bed and put it on. She told him to give her a twirl and he humoured her. She clapped and asked him if he's sure he doesn't want to date her. Told him it would really grate on Riley if she had him on his arm. He laughed and said that he wasn't going to be her trophy boyfriend, that she first had to get under Riley Costello, so she could get over him, and then maybe he'd give her that type of attention. He turned to look back at his reflection, and he was slightly taken aback by his appearance. He wore this suit when his stepmother had died, it was baggier on him back then, but now it fitted him perfectly. It made him look empowered. His usual attire gave off a dangerous edge, warned people that he was not going to be candy floss and candy canes, but this. This didn't just make him look like he was someone to be feared, it made him look like he was someone to be respected.

"You look good, right?" Anne spoke from beside him. He hadn't even realised she moved.

"Anne, please, I always look good." Then he left the room and called his sister and her friend's attention.

Cheryl was all smiles and disbelief and Lynsey just sort of stared at him, gobsmacked.

"Pick your tongue up off the floor, Lyns." He grinned at her when she couldn't take her eyes off his chest, where his buttons were straining to stay closed.

She shook her head a little and gave him a sheepish smile.

"You really buying a car?" Cheryl asked.

He looked at Anne again, and she was all smiles. "Yes. Yes, I am."

"That's a little random. You only sold your old one a couple of months ago?"

Well, a couple of months ago he didn't realise he'd still be here. He didn't say that though, she'd be all offended by it and he didn't want to deal with any drama. Instead he just shrugged at her and asked Lynsey why she wasn't in college. He wasn't fishing for anything on Steven. He wasn't. She told him something about a burst pipe and how they were all sent home; she thought she'd spend the day hanging out with Cheryl. Brendan responded to her by telling her how he'll ask her again at night, because that story was about to put him to sleep. She chucked a pillow at him, and he told her to watch the hair.

Anne and Brendan left the house with the girls putting on a DVD of Bridget Jones Diary, when Anne started the questions up again. He got it now; she wanted him to let his guard down before she bombarded him. He told her to let it go, but she wasn't having any of it.

"I just want to know what exactly it is that you're planning to do with Ste." She was going on and on at him, and when he saw Warren turn the corner and walk towards them, he practically pleaded for her to shut up.

But it was too late. Warren had gotten close enough to them to hear the boy's name being spoken.

"Oh, you've told her about rat boy then?" He had forgotten what Warren had named the boy.

"Oi, don't call him rat boy. He's cute. Kind of scrawny for my taste, but..."

"Do you have a crush on _rat boy_, Mitzeee?" Warren asked Anne, emphasising his term for Steven.

She didn't answer him just crossed her arms and gave him a dirt. Then she asked what he knew about the boy, and Brendan had to stop this now.

"Anne, stop talking to Foxy, and let's go."

"Where are you guys going?"

"To buy a car, I can't ride around in your scrap heap for the rest of my life." Brendan said as he grabbed Anne's arm and tried to drag her away. The taxi they had called while they were in the flat, had arrived and was waiting for them.

"Oh great, I'll come with you guys. I'll just tell Bob that I ate something dodgy for lunch, and now my bowels won't quit."

Brendan was ready to tell him that it was okay, that they didn't need his assistance, but it was too late. He was already on the phone with his excuse. The three of them climbed into the back of the taxi, and he hoped that Anne would let the Steven thing go now that Warren was here. Except, Warren had peaked her curiosity.

"So what exactly do you know about Ste Hay?" She asked Warren.

Brendan didn't know what he could do to stop this now. He was in a moving vehicle, trapped with Warren and Anne. One was way too curious, and the other was way too willing to spill to her.

"Well, Brendan's pretending to be the kid's mate to get information out of him about Joey. Get the rapist fucker's own brother to betray him. Trust Brendan enough to spill anything he knows about the night or his brother, that would incriminate him. Maybe even doubt him. Then he'd tear the brothers apart." He looked at Brendan and grinned broadly, "If there is one thing that'll break Joey, it's his brother doubting him." Then he patted Brendan on the knee, like he was proud of him or something. "This guy is an evil genius. He isn't even using his fist."

Brendan didn't say anything, and when Anne looked at him all horrified, he turned away and looked out the window instead. She asked him if it was true and Warren guaranteed her that it was. Why else would he be spending time with the boy? It's a question Brendan had asked himself many times. They didn't speak much after that. Brendan continued to stare out, and he could feel Anne beside him trying to figure out who Brendan was. The guy she was friends with would not try to break someone like Steven up from the inside out. He'd just break their arm if he wanted answers. Wait, he did have a broken arm. Maybe she thought he did that too. They never really spoke about the attack.

When they got to the car dealers, Anne didn't say anything, she just walked in. And as they were waiting for a sales assistant, Warren asked him about the progress with the boy. Brendan said that he hadn't learnt anything new, so Warren told him, then maybe it was time to let the kid go. That maybe he wasn't the way.

Anne turned to look at him when he said, "maybe." She didn't have the look of someone who was disgusted in him. It was something else, it was a look that said Warren was speaking out of his arse hole, that both of them knew that the last thing Brendan wanted to do, was hurt Steven Hay.

They were finished with those car dealers pretty quickly. Brendan had caught his eye on a silver BMW, and that was the car he wanted. Everything else appeared bland in comparison. His insistence that he didn't want to see any more cars made Anne laugh for the first time since Warren had joined them. Warren was like a kid in a candy store in the place. He was sitting behind several different wheels and imagining himself behind it. Anne had been right when she said the salesperson wouldn't take someone dressed casually seriously. They barely paid Warren, who was in jeans and a bomber jacket, any attention. Yet, Anne and Brendan were being treated like they shat gold.

It wasn't long before Brendan was in the driver's seat of his swanky new car. Warren had called shotgun, so he was sitting in the front passenger's seat, and Anne was in the back admiring the leather interior. They drove back to the village, all the while Warren was talking about all the things that were incredible about the car, and how he'd have to borrow it one day, so he could use the roomy backseat with Anne. Anne sat in the back and filed her nails, rolling her eyes at him. And Brendan, he just enjoyed the smooth ride. He had taken the thing for a test drive, but it was more enjoyable now that he owned the car.

When they got back to the village, Warren asked if they wanted a drink. Brendan had agreed, except when Warren stepped foot outside of the car, he had slammed the door close and driven away. He watched in the rearview mirror as Warren gave him the middle finger. Anne laughed and poked her head in between the two front seats.

"Thought you'd be avoiding any alone time with me."

Brendan's smile fell off his face, "are you ever going to let it go?"

"Nope."

"Then let's get this over and done with."

They didn't drive far. Just to the nearest park. He needed to be somewhere open or something, if he was going to have this conversation. It was Anne's idea to go the park, she even insisted they stop and buy bread as if they were six year old kids. She had informed him that you could never be too old to feed the ducks.

That's why he found himself being told off by a pissed off Anne for taking a large chunk of the loaf of Bread and chucking it at a duck's head, scaring it and making it flap its wings all over the place.

He couldn't stop himself from laughing at her reaction.

She turned back to the ducks and chucked more bread, small pieces it into the water. "Well?" She asked.

"Everything Warren said was the truth." He told her as he pinched a small slice of the bread.

"But..."

"But that was only the plan. Things didn't work out like that. I don't...I don't even ask him about Joseph, Anne." He stopped feeding the ducks and sat down on the benches near the water.

"Because it's not Joey you're spending time with him for, anymore?" She sat down and looked at him as he watched the ripples the ducks made in the water.

"I guess. Except, I can't really remember ever asking him about Joseph. And I'm beginning to think… he was never the reason for it in the start."

"You care about him?"

He turned to look at her this time. He couldn't answer that. But she could see it in his face. "I really don't want him to find out who I am. Ever."

"It's gonna happen. Sooner or later." She gave him a smile that said it would be okay when it did. But he knew better.

Steven was getting so far into his thoughts that he was hearing his voice. Hearing him laugh and say something like, pass the ball. But then Anne was standing up and looking over at where the voice was coming from. When Brendan turned around, it was like he conjured the boy just by talking about him. He was with two girls, one was waif like and it looked as if a stiff wind could knock her over. The other was a girl in a high ponytail and large hoops. There was also a boy. One that had on a knitted jumper that looked like he had stolen it from his grandmother's back. They hadn't noticed Brendan yet. Steven and the boy were kicking the ball to each other, whilst the girls cheered them on. Brendan found himself standing up and looking at him more closely. Steven had a grin on his face.

He had forgotten all about Friday night. He was over it.

But then Steven kicked the ball too hard and it came flying their way. Anne shrieked and moved out of the way before it could hit her. And the ball came to a stop as it fell onto the bench. Trust that to happen. Out of all the directions and places for the ball to go, it practically falls on to his lap. If he were sitting down, it might have. But now he had Steven's attention, and the boy was looking at him with the blue eyes that were visible even from this distance. He dropped his smile and stared back at him. Brendan's heart climbed up into his throat, it made it difficult for him to breathe. Steven didn't move, but his group moved closer to him. And then the boy with the knitted jumper stood on his tip toes slightly, to whisper something into Steven's ear, and the boy nodded, his eyes still attached to Brendan's.

The girl with the ponytail asked Brendan if they could have their ball back, and the boy was still too close to Steven. Brendan picked up the ball and threw it in another direction to where they were. As far away as possible. He heard the girl swear and all of them went after it. All of them except Steven. He still stood there, until the waif like girl pulled at his sleeve to come along.

When Steven walked away too, Brendan grabbed Anne's arm and headed back to the car. In there, he cradled his head in his hand and heard Anne ask him, "You pissed him off, didn't you?"

Brendan didn't reply, instead he started attacking his steering wheel and Anne let him do it. He did it until he was out of breath and heard Steven's voice again through his open window.

"Rae, you kick like a girl."

"In case you've missed it, I am a girl." Responded the one that must've been Rae. Brendan looked up at his rearview mirror. It was the one with the pony tail. He was right, she was trashy. What did Steven see in her?

Steven laughed, "Doug even kicks better than you."

So the guy that whispered in his ear was Douglas. The Douglas he had dinner with, and said he'd spend more time with. That Douglas. The guy whose name just made Brendan want to hit him.

"Excuse me, I'm gay. My penis hasn't been replaced by women's lady bits."

Brendan's top lip curled at the boy mentioning his sexuality. He hated him even more.

"I love how you can say penis, but can't say the women's version."

Douglas shoved Steven, "neither can you."

The waif like girl spoke up, "I'm still curious as to how gentiles determine football skills." She must have been Amy.

"I don't know, but I do know that Doug is so bent, he can't kick the ball straight." Steven did that honking laugh of his, and Brendan didn't even realise he missed it.

They were only a few feet from his car now; he should've driven away as soon as he saw Steven. Instead he watched as Douglas gave a sarcastic laugh, grabbed the ball from Steven's clutches, and settled it on the floor. He readied himself before he came forward and kicked the ball right onto Brendan's brand new car.

Someone up there was having a laugh.

Brendan wasn't even thinking when he climbed out of the car, grabbed Douglas by the collar and slammed him against the wall. The boy had an American accent and he was stuttering some form of apology. Rae was telling him to get the fuck off the lad, and calling him a psycho. Amy was pulling at his arm, and he didn't dare look at Steven. But he heard him. He was the only voice that was clear.

"Get off him. It..." Brendan turned to look at the boy and he was scared. Scared of what Brendan was going to do. "It wasn't his fault, it was mine. If you wanna hit anyone, hit me."

The American was protesting, telling Steven to shut up. Brendan smacked him against the wall again for that. And then Steven had said please. And Brendan deflated. Whatever anger he was feeling, for whatever reason, went away. And he didn't know if Steven was telling Brendan to hit him for the ball, or for Friday night.

Brendan let the American go and climbed back into his car. Anne hadn't even left it. She just looked at Brendan when he got back in worryingly. He drove her back to the pub without a word, and then drove home. He had an appointment with a whisky bottle.

She didn't mention anything the next day at work about the events of the previous day. She asked him how he liked his car, and how he now had to play her chauffeur. He questioned if that was the real reason she wanted him to buy a car, and she was just manipulating him by using Warren as an excuse. She smiled at him and wiggled her bum as she walked away. They didn't talk about Steven, or how he attacked his steering wheel, or even how he nearly knocked out the American kid. Brendan assumed Anne had made her own conclusions and she wouldn't speak of them unless they were confirmed. Until then, he had a bit of peace.

Brendan was practicing cocktails with her, seeing as Tuesday nights were dry anyway, and Katy was out with her friends, so they had control over the bar. She was offering him her opinions when he saw a blonde headed movement from the corner of his eyes. When he turned to look at who it was, he could feel his anger rising in him at a frightening rate, like layers of bricks. With every second that passed, the wall of his anger grew taller, till he couldn't see anything, but it. Danny Houston was sitting at the bar.

He approached the blonde Londoner with a bottle of beer, slid it to him, and the cockney bloke picked it up, tilted it n thanks before putting it to his mouth. Brendan told him to come through the door that led to the house, so they could talk.

He led him up the stairs and into the living area, "what do you want, Danny?" He asked, arms folded across his chest.

Danny gave him a smile that was the epitome of slime, "just wondering how you're doing. Haven't heard from you in a while."

"Were you expecting to hear from me?" Brendan knew that the man was expecting him to go running and thank him for beating a kid up.

"Well, seeing as you were too scared to come to our little gathering, I thought you'd at least be grateful that my fellas and I sorted that little Hay for you." Danny was completely guilt free in his mannerisms, not that Brendan expected the bloke to feel bad. But he was inspecting ornaments around the room like Steven didn't even deserve his full attention when speaking of him.

Brendan snatched the little glass dolphin that Danny had is grubby paws on and settled it back down on the shelf. He got up close to Danny's face, to show that he wasn't going to let himself be intimated by the southerner. "You want me to be grateful? You, a grown arse man and his three brain dead bulldogs, beat a seventeen year old kid up on his way from school." Brendan took off some imaginary lint from the blonde's suit jacket, "I thought you had more class than that."

Danny laughed and walked away from him. Settled down on a sofa and played around with a cushion. "You see, Brendan, I have an investment in you. You call those blokes of mine, my bulldogs." He tossed the pillow aside. "But you've been one of them for a long time."

"Fuck you." Brendan swore, but it just made Danny laugh.

"I have a loyalty to my men, and whether you like it or not, you became one of them when you came looking for..." Danny raised an eyebrow, "a job." He wasn't talking about the type of jobs you get taxed for. "So I need your head in the game, that's not gonna happen when you have your sister's rape trial hanging over your head. I was doing you a favour."

"I never asked you to do that. I'm not gonna owe you, Danny." He had to make that clear. He was not going to be in Danny Houston's debt.

"Because it didn't work?" Danny asked with a sadistic grin. "I can organise another hit."

Brendan didn't realise he was even moving when he hauled Danny up from the sofa and punched him across the face. The only evidence he had of even doing anything, was the fact that Danny's nose was bleeding and he was screaming at him. "STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM STEVEN!"

Brendan was breathing heavily and his knuckles were covered in Danny's blood, and he knew that Danny was going to hit back. Not now, but eventually. And he'd hit him hard.

Anne was at the door now, looking between Danny and Brendan. Brendan had his full on attack stance, and Danny Houston was down on the sofa with a bleeding nose. She didn't ask questions, she just looked at Brendan and said, "He's back."

He's back? Who's back? Steven's back?

When his face told her that he had no clue as to who she was talking about, she said, "Ste, he's downstairs. Shall I bring him up after you've finished with..?" She tilted her head towards Danny.

He could've screamed at her then, why did she have to say that in front of Danny? Danny who was wiping his nose now and chuckling loudly. He guessed she thought the blond knew about his original intentions with Steven. That if Warren knew, then Danny definitely did. Whenever he had to do something awful, the southerner was normally behind it. So he got why Anne would think that it was okay to say Steven's name in front of him.

But it wasn't. And when he sent Anne back down, telling her he'll come down in a bit, Danny was standing up and practically cackling into Brendan's face. "Developed a soft spot for the Hay boy, have you?" He cocked his head, "You always did become a pussy when it came to young boys." He came closer up into Brendan's face. "Remember Vinnie? I asked you to send him a message from me, because the little fucker didn't pay his debt. You couldn't do it, so I had to get my own hands dirty." He stepped back from Brendan and straightened out his suit. "I let that go, I did. Because I like you, Brendan. But I put my men's freedom on the line for you. And if you can't accept my favour, I'll have to think of a way to even us out."

"I never asked you for anything, Danny."

"Still." He grinned and headed for the door. "I'll go through the back door, shall I? So your little _friend _doesn't see that you're acquainted with his attacker." He started to leave, but not before he let Brendan know the he'd see him around.

Brendan washed his hand to get rid of the blood that was drying on his knuckles, before he headed down the stairs and out to the bar. Steven was sitting there with a cocktail and laughing at something or the other with Anne. When he approached them, Steven swallowed down his laugh and sat up straight on his stool. He told Anne that Steven wasn't allowed to be served alcohol at the bar, and Katy would be pissed if she found out. Apparently there wasn't any alcohol in the drink, it was what Anne called, a mocktail. He nodded at her like he was listening, but he was too aware of Steven to be paying her any real attention. When he managed to get rid of her, he told Steven to follow him up the stairs and back into the living room. The room where he had just punched the guy that was the reason behind Steven's still fading bruises.

"What can I do for you, Steven?"

The boy looked nervous, and he started playing with the sleeves of the chef whites he was wearing. "I erm...I'm working at the restaurant again. Tony told me I could take time off to heal, but I wanted to go back." He looked up at Brendan, "so I was in the area, I thought I'd come in."

Brendan sat down on one of the sofas and he watched as Steven sat on the arm of another. He looked good in chef whites, the ones he was wearing were slightly big on him, but he looked comfortable in them, like they made him feel powerful. Just like how Brendan had felt in the suit the previous day.

"Why?" Brendan asked when Steven didn't continue. He guessed Steven was hoping for some direction in this conversation. But truth be told, he was just as lost as Steven. Looking at the boy now, he had to concentrate really hard not to let his mind wander to what happened between them in Warren's car. Or let his eyes wander down to those lips that he could still feel against his own.

The boy shrugged. "You were about to beat up Doug yesterday, which by the way was totally out of order. You had no right doing that. But I figured it were because you were angry with me. For doing what I did. I just wanted to say sorry."

So they were going to have this conversation, eh? "Why did you do it?"

"I don't know." Steven was speaking to himself more than he was to Brendan. "I was drunk, it's not even like I've even done it before."

"You blaming me?"

"No, I didn't mean that."

"You think I'm queer?"

"No, I just... I don't think it has anything to do with you. I think it's me." Steven was speaking fast; as if he needed to get the words out as soon as possible, get Brendan to understand. He was scared that Brendan was going to beat him up for pulling that stunt. He took a deep breath and continued, "But I do think you kissed me back."

That had Brendan standing up and towering over the boy, "say that again." He bent down closer to the boy's face, he could see his spit flying on to him as he spoke, "I dare you". Steven didn't speak, but he held eye contact with Brendan, he wasn't backing down. "I ain't no arse bandit, Steven."

"I'm not gay either, Brendan. All I know is that..." He let out a shaky breath. "I'm really, really confused."

Brendan backed away. He walked over to the window and stared out, it was getting dark and he really wanted Steven gone from here. Having the boy around him was doing nothing to help his own confused head. But he didn't kiss him back. He didn't. He's not gay.

"Maybe you should ask that Rae bird out." He didn't know why he suggested it. Steven was too good for her. But they were straight. Both of them. What happened in the car was a mistake, and Steven needed to get the notion that Brendan had kissed him back ,out of his head. Brendan didn't.

Steven laughed somewhere behind him, it was mirthless and sounded like disbelief. Brendan turned around to look at him, and watched as the boy straightened out his top. He was leaving, heading for the door, but when he reached it, he turned around and said, "Or maybe I'll ask out Doug. The guy whose head you nearly bit off, he's gay. Maybe he can help me understand." He said it to get a reaction from Brendan, he was angry and he wanted to see if Brendan would care.

He didn't.

He ignored the feeling erupting inside of him when Steven uttered those words. His organs felt like they were bursting with the effort he was making to appear nonchalant. He smiled at the boy, a tight one and shrugged. Steven shook his head slightly, disappointed, before he shut the door behind him. Brendan watched out the window as Steven crossed the road and back into the Italian restaurant. He waited until the boy was completely out of sight before he picked up the vase that was sitting on a small table by the window, and threw it across the room. A sound exploded from inside of him as he did it, it sounded an awful lot like pain.

He punched the wall to make himself hurt in a different kind of way.


	12. Chapter 12

**Chapter 12**

"Oh my god, you didn't need the cheese, did you?"

Amy was sitting on the countertop in the Il Gnosh kitchen, feeding herself shredded cheese from a packet. She and Ste had come straight to the restaurant after college, so he could practice some dishes for the culinary school people, as well as help out in the kitchen. That way he wouldn't be wasting Tony's ingredients for free. But he needed Amy, because other than stirring a pot, he couldn't even peel a potato.

There were still a few weeks left till the school representatives came to see him, but he still had no clue as to what to cook for them. They bloody ran a school; they probably tasted everything there is to eat. Panic was slowly starting to rise in him, because every menu he came up with just seemed to be completely shit.

"No, Amy, I didn't need the cheese _you_ bought to take home. Hell'd freeze over before Tony uses processed cheese from a packet in his kitchen." He laughed and told her, as he deleted the entire menu he'd come up with and typed up on the laptop Amy was letting him borrow, while his right arm was out of use. It was easier to type with his left hand, than write with it. Plus, there was the bonus of spell check. "But I do need you to get off that top before Tony gets back in here."

She jumped down just as the restaurant owner came back in from his break, and stopped short as he looked at Ste's laptop screen.

"I could've sworn there was an entire menu on that before I left." He took the laptop off Ste and minimised the word document, as if he might find the menu on another tab. When he couldn't, he placed the laptop back down.

"Yeah, we cooked it." He pointed to the half eaten starter, main and desert in the corner of the kitchen. "I didn't like it, so I'm starting again."

"By '_we_' he means me." Amy said as Tony went over to where the food lay. "He just bossed me about and swore loads and load when I messed up."

Tony laughed and said how chefs did that when they felt like they had no control over what was happening to their food. How it must be even more frustrating for Ste, because he couldn't even show Amy what to do properly. Then he turned to the starter Ste had designed and took a bite of it. Ste held his breath while Tony slowly chewed and eventually swallowed. Ste was waiting for a comment, but the man simply turned to the main next, and did the same with that before turning to the desert. He didn't say a word in between.

Tony sighed. And Ste felt like an elastic band of tension snapped inside of him, and whipped around to hit his gut with a sting. Tony hated it too.

Ste turned around back to the laptop, so the older man wouldn't be able see his face.

"Ste, this is nice. But that's all it is."

"I know. That's why I'm starting from the beginning." He couldn't help the snap in his tone. He was trying, he was.

"Ste look at me." Tony voice was soft, and Ste guess that he was trying to be... What's that term? Constructively critical. Yeah, that. But without being harsh. He didn't want to hurt Ste's feelings. Ste turned. "You've been distracted. I've left you in the kitchen in the past to make some of my own stuff, and you've made it better than I have." He laughed then, and Ste smiled. "Yeah, I hate to admit it, but you have."

"Well, it's me arm inneh? It's not like I can make it meself. There's only so much Amy can do." He heard an 'oi' coming from somewhere beside him. "If I can't cook it meself, then it's gonna taste crap no matter what."

Tony looked at him like he was assessing him, like he didn't think that's what it was. He asked if Ste was sure that's all that was wrong, because if that was the only thing, then he'd call the school and ask them to reschedule. He asked if maybe it had anything to do with what was going on with Joey, because if that's what it was, it wasn't weeks he'd have to wait till the distraction was gone. He'd have to wait months. A trial like Joey's wasn't something that would be over with quickly.

Truth be told, it wasn't either of those things. Ste knew if he gave Amy detailed enough instructions, she'd do a decent job. He could handle how long something had to be heated for, boiled, grilled et cetera. He could stir the correct way with his left arm; he could put the appropriate amount of ingredients in. So it wasn't his arm forcing him to make crappy food. But it wasn't Joey either. If he stood up in court and told the truth, and so did Joey, Joey would be fine. Right? There was nothing to worry about. He made himself believe that.

The problem was another twenty one year old. One who looked far too old for his age and had a tendency to act like a menacing as fuck predator. And now he was preying on Ste's mind, consuming it, eating away at his other thoughts, so all that was left was him and the memory of his fingers clawing into the side of Ste's face. And the most wrong thing out of all this, was not that he couldn't get Brendan Brady out of his head, but that a part of him didn't want to. He wanted to hold on to everything that he was. He wanted to remember the way he walked, like he owned the whole god dammed world. The way he talked, if you said something stupid, don't expect him to give you a serious answer. The way he laughed, it would start as a low rumble in his belly, before climbing up to his chest, and escaping out of his mouth.

What he wanted to forget was that kissing him was probably the most stupid fucking thing he'd ever done. He couldn't even say he kissed the lie Brendan was pretending to be, the one that took him to all night cinemas and told Ste that he liked spending time with him. He kissed the one that was a liar. In all his glory. He knew who he was, he knew why Brendan was wasting his time with him, and still, he made that move. There were so many things wrong with that night. He kissed a guy. And not just any, but one that probably lusted over his and his brother's blood.

Making that move wasn't planned. He hadn't even been thinking of what he was doing when he leaned into Brendan. When he ran home and washed his face, the events of the nights sobering him up fast, he realised that he felt so betrayed by what Brendan had done, because at some point, he started liking Brendan as more than friends. In the week that they had spent together, Ste was in it deeper than he thought. And all this time, Brendan had been using him for the other Hay. Ste was just a means to an end, and despite whatever it was that he felt towards Brendan, that's all he'd ever be. He wasn't even a friend to the older boy. That's why the lie that hurt so fucking bad.

Yet, if he really thought hard about what happened in the car, he could've sworn that Brendan kissed him back. Even for a split second. The crescent marks on the side of his face from Brendan's nails told him that much. He hadn't even noticed them until Joey called him a dirty bugger and pressed hard into them with his finger. Ste had lightly touched over them, and it was as if that movement triggered a flashback of the kiss. He kissed the older boy that was a definite. The part he wasn't completely sure about was whether it was just his imagination, when he felt Brendan pull him closer.

"Ste, what do you want me to do?" Tony asked when Ste hadn't spoken for a while.

He shook his head a little. "It has nothing to do with Joey. Call the school. Ask them if they'd reschedule."

Tony reached for the phone that was attached to the wall to call, but first he told Ste that this would look bad to the school, and how they might just tell him to forget it. Ste shrugged. There was nothing he could do. A broken arm with a broken head was not a good mix when it came to cooking. Because that was what he had, a broken head. It had to be if he kissed a bloke. He'd never done that before. He'd never even really thought about it before. So okay, he'd think certain guys were appealing to the eye. But that was just pointing out a fact. If a guy was handsome, he was handsome. There was nothing gay about that, he didn't fancy them. He didn't imagine kissing them.

But then there was Brendan. They guy was good-looking, nobody could deny that. His blue eyes, contrasting with his pale skin and almost black hair, they created a look that turned heads. Granted, sometimes those heads were turned because he had the appearance of a grim reaper. Ste didn't even think he fancied Brendan until after Friday night. Then he realised that he paid far too much attention to the guy's size and appearance, and how he liked the dangerous edge Brendan gave off. How he liked the contrast between them. Brendan looked too old for his age, Ste looked too young. Ste wasn't short in height, but Brendan was tall. Ste - as a whole - was small; Brendan looked like he could crush him in the palm of his hand. But those were all aspects that Ste thought were actually kind of hot.

You know if he was a girl, and Brendan was Brendan. Because they weren't gay. Neither of them. But maybe that was something Ste should reconsider. Because he liked kissing Brendan.

Ste turned back to the laptop and closed it. Told Tony to make the call. Then he went to the locker room to change out of his whites with my following him close behind.

"Are you sure you want to postpone?" She asked, as he struggled to get his right sleeve out over the cast. She eventually took pity and came to help him with it.

"Yes. I'm obviously not gonna be able to cook anything half decent, if I only have one arm." He chucked the top into his locker when it finally came off, and reached in for a dark shirt and an orange tie. "If they say I can't do it later, and they wanna cancel all together, then fine. I wouldn't have got the place anyway, not with food that tastes like it's been scraped from the bottom of the rubbish bin."

Amy sat down in one of the chairs that was in the room, and looked at him like he was acting like a drama queen. Hey, maybe he was a queen. "Ste, it wasn't that bad. Tony even said it was nice. Just maybe not what the school would be looking for."

"Whatever." He pushed his pants down and put on his work slacks, before stuffing the laptop and everything else in his locker and slamming it closed. He wasn't even awkward about changing in front of Amy. Neither of them was. Maybe that should've rung alarm bells about his sexuality. "Amy?"

"Yeah?" She wasn't even looking at him, too interested in the packet of cheese still in her hands.

"I kissed someone last week." He didn't know why he said it. He couldn't exactly tell her the full story.

It made her head snap up with a massive grin. "Ooh details, Steven Hay."

He changed his mind. He didn't want to tell her anything. This was his mess; he'd have to sort it out on his own. "Forget it, it was nothing."

"Oh come on, everyone loves telling the ex details. Are you embarrassed of her? That's it, isn't it?" She giggled and put her legs up on the chair, so she could cross them. She was getting herself comfortable, which meant one thing. She was intent on getting as much out of Ste as possible. He should've kept his mouth shut.

"It's nobody."

"Does nobody have a name?" She was looking at him all suspicious, and giddy. She was happy. She thought Ste had found someone, and with everything the pair had been through in their disaster of a relationship, she always wanted Ste to find happiness.

He picked up a box of tissue and threw it at her before he told her to shut up and left her in the locker room, so he could go serve some tables. He managed to go two hours of being out front before he found himself at the large window of the restaurant, where he get to see the pub Brendan worked at. He couldn't see much, it was October now, so there weren't even people outside drinking. All that he could see was the building, and the knowledge that a very pissed of Brendan was in there.

Whether he believed Brendan had kissed him back or not, he had well and truly angered thedark haired boy. Something that Ste should've felt glad about. Brendan was using him; it was only fair that he wound him up. On Saturday that's what he told himself, that no matter what he was feeling; at least he pissed of Brendan. With the way he shouted at him to get out of the car, it was as if he would've throttled him if he didn't leave. He told himself that it was a good thing to have made Brendan feel like that, because as he spent the weekend with his brother and his mates, he knew that feeling anything else was dangerous territory. Joey was his brother, he loved him; he should not be kissing the bloke who wanted him dead.

But then he saw Brendan in the park on Monday. He was with Mitzeee and he looked so sad at first. He was in a suit, and Mitzeee was wearing black, so he just put that down to them going to a funeral or something. But he looked so handsome in his outfit, and not the type of handsome where he was just pointing out fact, he really did fucking fancy Brendan. When he saw him standing there, he couldn't take his eyes off how amazing he looked. Then Doug had crept up into his ear and whispered how that was Brendan Brady. He nodded his head a little, he knew who that was, and all he could think about was being near him.

Brendan's expression had changed to anger in a snap and he had thrown their football god knows where. It was a childish move, but he probably didn't think that Steven was worth anything more. They managed to retrieve the ball, and he tried to force himself not to think about Brendan by engaging in some stupid conversation with his friends, and then Doug had kicked the ball at some fancy car to prove a point.

And finally he managed to see just how much he had wound Brendan up. He had climbed out of the car, and shoved Doug against the wall, a shove that was bound to leave a bruise over his entire back. He knew that Brendan would have a violent side, he looked it and he'd alluded to it many times. But his expression had been like that of a mad man. It was all twisted up and he had his teeth bared. Steven had to plead with him to let go. Even told him that he should hit him instead, because the core of Brendan's problem was Ste, Doug hitting the ball against his car was just a trigger.

He had let go though, when Ste said please. He must've seen how pathetic Ste was.

"Is it a McQueen?" Amy's voice was in his ear. He looked away from the window that he had been pretending to clean, to look at his blond headed friend.

"Yeah, you guessed right."

"Ah, which one, which one?"

"I've been getting it on with Myra, haven't I?" He joked as he walked back behind the bar of the restaurant and sprayed the tops. Myra was the oversize McQueen mother, and she was probably the least sexy person in that household. That said something; she had John Paul as a son.

"Congratulation, when's the wedding?" She rolled her eyes as she settled on the opposite side of the bar. "Is it Rae?"

He stopped wiping and looked her dead in the eye. "Yep."

She looked slightly disappointed by that. "Oh... I thought you were seeing some right weirdo."

He had to stop himself from pointing out that if he was to have kissed Rae last week, she would've mentioned something by now. They all hung out together for goodness sake, one of them would've said something to give it away. She shrugged after that and went back to get her coat and bag, so she could go home. On her way she stopped to tell him that she was really happy for him. That even though they all hung out together, and now one of his friends was his girlfriend, and the other was his ex, she was happy that they could all look past that. She said how maybe Rae could be the girlfriend she never could be.

And that felt like a sucker punch.

Amy was the only female in his life that loved him, that looked past all his flaws, accepted him whole heartedly, and here he was, lying to her. She stood by when most people would've fled and never looked back. She was the best girlfriend anyone could've wanted, anyone could've needed. He was the boyfriend that didn't deserve her.

When they were together he was always so angry, and more often than not, it had nothing to do with her. He was just becoming like Terry. She was there, she was weaker than he was, and when she cowered in front of him, he felt a sense of perverse power. Just like Terry when it came to him. They had been dating for nearly a year when things got really bad. At first he used to just scream at her loads, would vent out all his home frustration on her, he'd throw things around the room, but one night he had gotten really mad.

Her dad was out and it was just them. They had gotten into an argument about nothing in particular, but back then, it didn't take much to piss him off. It wasn't like when they normally argued though, Amy was shouting back and she told him she didn't want to be with him anymore. He was crushed, because despite everything, he loved her, he did. He had begged her not to break up with him, and when she wouldn't give in, he got angry. Angrier than he'd ever been, he had backed her against the wall and punched and punched till he was so tired, he couldn't lift his arm up anymore.

She had been terrified of him then. He remembered how her head had turned, so she could see the wall beside her face covered in his blood. He didn't hit her. He managed to have enough self-control to stop himself; instead he lashed out on the wall beside her. His fist smashing into the wall, inches away from her face again and again. But at that moment, they had both known how close he'd come to doing what he did to the wall, to her. She ran away from him then, and he had tried to apologise, but she had told him to get out.

So he did. He ran all the way home, tears streaming down his face. And when he got there, Terry had been drinking loads and Joey was nowhere to be seen. He hadn't even bothered shutting the front door, when he had grabbed the drink from Terry's hand and threw it across the room. His stepdad had asked him what he thought he was doing, he didn't answer, he needed to piss Terry off, needed to do it while Joey wasn't there to save him. He threw the TV off its stand and started smashing the living room apart. Finally Terry had grabbed him, threw him onto the ground and punched him across the face. He screamed at him, told him if that was all he had, called him a pussy. Terry had hit him again, harder. And still Ste asked for more, begged for it.

For the first time in his life, he had felt a sense of gratitude towards his stepdad. As Terry pounded into him, stood up a few times to kick him, before lifting him up to grab his head and smack it against a wall, he felt like this was the end. He deserved everything he was getting from Terry; he had nearly hit Amy, the girl he was supposed to love. He deserved this, he deserved to die, to die like _this_. Beaten to death. And the last thing he remembered before darkness took over his vision, was Amy, pleading for him to stay awake.

When he had woken up in hospital Joey, Amy and Amy's dad, Mike were there. When the police asked what happened to him, he said he couldn't remember. Mike had shaken his head in disappointment. When the police left, Amy's dad had told him that he didn't say anything to the police himself, because he didn't know if that's what Ste wanted. But he thought Ste should still report him. Ste had told him he asked for it from Terry, and Joey was outraged. Said something like, Terry was a bully and Ste never asked for any of this.

Ste remembered turning to look at Amy, who was sitting on the visitors chair and silently crying. He told them again that he had asked for it. This time he had wanted it, this time he wanted Terry to finish him off, because he was no better than him. He wanted Terry to kill him, before he turned into him completely. She cried harder after that. Joey was confused, asked him what the hell he was going on about, and Ste had wanted to tell him that his little brother wasn't so little.

Mike had asked if it was anything to do with the fact that he came home to find his daughter crying and his wall all bloodied up. Amy later told Ste that when her dad came home not longer after he had left, he thought Ste had hit his daughter. Mike had no clue how close Ste had come to doing it, but Amy had told her dad that he was just really upset with things at home and lashed out on the wall. She had assured her father that he would never hit her, but she was really worried about him. Begged her dad to drive him to their house, so she could make sure he was okay. After what he had done to her, she was still worried about him. She had come to save him.

Mike had told Joey that it wasn't a good idea to let him go home, and if there was anywhere else Ste could go. That's when Amy asked if he could stay with them. Mike wasn't too keen, but he couldn't exactly let Ste go home to Terry, so he had agreed. Amy wanted him to live with her, so he wouldn't have to go home to Terry, knowing that she was inviting in a Terry in the making. Joey agreed, told them that he'd get Ste's stuff over later.

Once he had gotten to the Barnes' flat, he noticed that the blood was gone from the walls. Amy told him that her dad cleaned it up when she was with him in the hospital. He asked her why she wanted him here, and she had told him that she loved him. That she didn't want to be with him anymore, but she cared for him. She had conditions though. She wouldn't tell her dad anything, or even Joey, if he promised to see the school counsellor for his anger issues. He agreed, anything to keep her in his life.

For months after that, she supported him through the whole ordeal of working through his anger. They didn't get back together, but she was his friend, and he needed that more than anything. Someone that cared for him, even when they didn't have to. He continued to go to his meetings, even after Terry forced him to go home; he stuck it out, because it meant keeping Amy in his life. And he got better slowly; he never felt the urge to hit her again. She rescued him in more ways than one, when she came to his house that day.

That's what he had meant that one night, when he had told Brendan that Amy saved him. She saved him from becoming Terry. And nobody, but them knew.

She deserved for him to be honest with her.

"Amy." She was at the door, when he called out to her.

She was shoving her bag up her shoulder as she turned round to his voice, "hmm?"

"It isn't Rae."

"Who is she then?" She sighed and rolled her eyes.

He looked around, made sure no one was looking, listening, or in need of his attention. Then he walked up to her, licked his dry lips, and with a nervous tremor in his voice, he whispered, "it isn't a she." He couldn't look at her, so he played with his sleeves. "It's a he. I kissed a guy."

When he looked up, her jaw hit the floor.

Ste looked round to see if he could find Tony, when he couldn't, he told the person working the bar that he was going for a break. They rolled their eyes and said something about how he wasn't doing any work anyway, then Ste grabbed Amy by the arm and dragged her back into the locker room. He sat down on the chair and buried his face in his hands. There he'd said it. He kissed a guy. Even though the main issue wasn't even that, it was who he kissed that was the bigger problem.

Amy just stared at him for a while, and then pulled her fingers through her hair. "Does that mean you're gay?"

Ste didn't even bother lifting his head up for that. He just shrugged.

"But we've had sex. You weren't…" she stopped, and Ste had to look up to see what it was. She stared at him for a little while before she continued. "You weren't thinking of boys then, were you?" Then she gasped, "Oh my god was it all fake, was I a cover up? I mean I'm the only girlfriend you've actually ever had. Everyone else has been just like a fling. Was I sham?"

He had to stop her before she got all upset, "course not, Amy."

Then she got a little awkward. Started playing with her nails. "So you did fancy me, then?"

He couldn't help laughing at that. They very rarely talked about the time they had together in a relationship. The fact that they fancied each other at one point, made them both a little shy. He offered her a coy smile when he reassured her. "I fancied you loads, you numpty."

"I'm sorry," she giggled again before she got a chair for herself and sat in front of him. "This is huge."

"I don't even know if I'm gay, Amy. All I know is that I kissed a guy."

"And you liked it. The taste of his… something, something." She sang, making them both laugh.

"Shut up, Amy."

"So you only kissed him?" When Ste nodded, she asked, "Have you told Joey?"

He shook his head. He wasn't planning to tell Joey this. Not until he figured out what was actually going on. Joey would ask him who it was that he kissed, and Ste already lied to him so much. There's only so many he could spill before the truth came out. "I don't want to tell him anything till I'm sure. Right now, I'm just confused, aren't I?"

"But he's your brother, maybe he can help you be…" she frowned a little, searching for the correct word. "Unconfused?"

"Amy, I don't think I'm gay." She made a face at him, like she thought he was being deluded. "I never even fancied a bloke before. I mean, I do fancy Rae, don't I?"

"Do you fancy the bloke you kissed?"

"Well… he's good-looking. And I didn't think I fancied him till after I kissed him. And I don't even like him. He's a horrible person."

She leaned back in her chair then, with a frown on her face. "Well, that's ruined my suspicions about it being Doug. I thought maybe that was the reason you wanted him to come out with us to dinner with Tony, and why he hangs out with us now. Doug isn't a horrible person though, so it can't be him."

Ste told her it wasn't Doug; it was a guy that wasn't even gay himself. A guy that probably wants to kill him for doing what he did. Amy asked if he was in danger, and he promised her that he wasn't.

At least, he thought he wasn't. He had gone to see Brendan the previous day in the pub. He wanted to see him, and he wanted to apologise. But mainly he just wanted to see him. See if it was all in his head, the attraction he felt towards the older boy. As soon as he was alone with the older boy again, he wanted to tell him that he knew. He knew who Brendan was, and he had kissed him anyway. He wanted Brendan to beat him up, so Ste could go away, hating Brendan. So he wouldn't feel this pull towards him. He had told him that what he did to Doug was out of order, but that he knew it was his fault, so he had apologised.

Even though angering Brendan was something he should've been happy about, he wasn't.

Then Brendan had gotten all defensive, when Ste told him that he thought that the older boy had kissed him back. Brendan had come up into his face, and with threat in his voice, he had dared Ste to repeat himself. He told Ste that he wasn't gay, and right then, Ste had seen that the insistence that he was straight was to convince himself, not Ste. Ste had tried to find common ground with him, told him he was confused. He knew Brendan must've been feeling the same way.

But Brendan's solution to that was for Ste to ask out Rae. As if fucking a girl would straighten his head out. Ste laughed a little when Brendan suggested that, not because it was funny. He couldn't believe that, if he was going to have confused feelings about anyone, it just had to be someone that not only was a lying, manipulative jerk who actually hated him, but was also so far back in the closet, that the closet was all he knew.

But maybe Ste was imagining things because he didn't want to be the only twisted one in this equation. He didn't want to think he was betraying Joey by having feelings for a Brady, without Brendan making the same mistake, and betraying his sister by having feelings for a Hay. So he told Brendan that he'd ask out Doug instead, just to see if he'd tell Ste not to. Or at least act like it. But he didn't, he just shrugged his shoulder. He didn't care what Ste did.

He had no intention of asking Doug out. The boy was an alright mate, but he didn't fancy him. Couldn't imagine ever kissing him. That meant he wasn't gay, right? He didn't fancy boys. Just Brendan. The worst person he could think of to fancy.

"Amy, what if this is just a one off. I kissed a bloke. But that's it. I still fancy girls, and I've never been with a bloke… you know… the way I've been with a girl. I didn't even kiss the guy with tongue. He stopped it before I could."

"But you wanted to?"

"What?"

"You know?" She smiled and wagged an eyebrow, "kiss him with tongue."

"I guess," he admited

"Did you get a…?" She wanted Ste to finish the sentence, but he didn't know what it was. "A stiffy." She scrunched up her nose and laughed. Ste could feel his ears going red, and he lifted up his arms to cover his face, he knew that it would give him away. She got it, anyway. "Oh my god, you did!" She squealed so loud that Ste had to put a hand to her mouth to get her to shut up.

Tony must've heard though, because he came in asking if Ste was going to be doing any work today, and how he'd like it if Amy left now, seeing as she was distracting his staff. She told him fine, but when he closed the door as he left, she asked Ste more questions. And this time her questions weren't ones just to fill her curiosity. It was serious ones.

"Do you… Do you think maybe… that was why you were so angry? You know, when you were with me. Do you think that's where all your frustration came from… the fact that you were confused about who you were?"

Ste sat forward in his chair and held her hand, "Amy, I was a screwed up arsehole back then. I had issues, probably still do. It was one hundred percent my fault. It had nothing to do with you, or the fact that you're a girl. You weren't the cause of my anger, but you were the solution to it. I love you so much for that." He kissed her on the forehead as a cherry on top to his mini speech, and it made her smile. That was one of the things that occurred more after they broke up, her smiles. She used to cry a lot when they were a couple, but as friends it was different, and sometimes he'd make her laugh so hard, she'd pee herself.

"Amy. Out. Now." Tony was back, and he wasn't going to leave till Amy did. Amy squealed a little and tightened her hand around Ste's before she got up and left. Told him she'd call him, and he responded by telling her he hoped she'd have a nice conversation with his voicemail.

He got back to work after that. He still had no idea what was going on with him, and he was still stuck feeling angry with Brendan for everything. Yet, he still felt like he wanted Brendan to care for him, because he cared about Brendan back, whether he liked it or not. That was probably the reason as to why he hadn't confronted Brendan about knowing who he was. He didn't want to reveal the truth, and then have Brendan not even pretend to like him. It would all be out in the open, and Ste would have nothing to hold onto. He wanted it to be like some soppy movie girls watch, where Brendan had wanted to play him, but it turned out that he really did like for Ste after all. That Ste was in Brendan's head, as much as Brendan was in his.

Life wasn't a movie though. And Ste should face facts. Brendan only spent time with him because he wanted to hurt Joey. This was fact, whether or not Brendan was behind his attack near the school alleyway. Ste was a twisted little fuck, who kissed him knowing who Brendan was, knowing that he was being used. Brendan might have kissed him back, he might not have. Either way, Brendan was not interested in Ste in any other way, than as a tool, an object that'd get him closer to getting to his goal. Brendan hated their family, and so by extension, he hated Ste. This. Was. Fact.

If he thought about Ste the way Ste thought about him, he would not have suggested that Ste ask someone else out. The thought of Brendan seeing someone made him slightly queasy with jealousy. When he saw Mitzeee and him together in the park, for a second he thought they were on a date not back from some funeral. They might've been on a date. The look of sadness was maybe something that Ste made up.

Shit, they were on a date. That was why he was even more pissed to see Ste. Ste the bloke who had kissed him, had come to haunt him, when he was trying to have a day out with a woman. A woman he wanted to kiss and probably have sex with.

By the time he was done with work, and on the bus home, Ste had concluded that even if Brendan kissed him back, Brendan was not interested in him. Ste was drunk and he kissed Brendan out of the blue, the bloke had no idea what was happening. When he did, he pushed Ste away. And when Ste went to see him at the pub, the denial he thought he saw in Brendan… well, that was something Ste had yet to figure out. Because he had seen it, he was completely sober, unlike Friday night. The denial wasn't something Ste was about to blame his imagination for. He guessed it would just have to be another thing that made Brendan Brady a mystery.

Xxx

Tony had decided to close the restaurant early. It was hammering down with rain, like fall on pissing down, and no one was going to come out to eat when the weather was like that. Last night, when he had gotten home, Amy had called him and giggled on the phone. He hadn't told her anything new, but she was still so excited for him. Joey asked what was going on, and he had told his brother that Amy's just crazy. The older Hay raised an eyebrow and looked at him sceptically. But he didn't tell Joey anything.

In college, Amy was at his case again. She dragged him away from Rae and Doug at one point and told him that she had a mini epiphany at night. That now she knew why he was distracted from cooking; he had a special someone on his mind. He told her to shut up, and she promised her lips were sealed. She gave him knowing glances, and whenever they were alone, she'd point someone out and asked if he fancied them.

She didn't get it. He didn't even get it. Just because he kissed a boy, it didn't make him lust over anything with a penis. He only liked Brendan like that. Not anyone else.

It was already starting to rain when he got to work, but it became something of a hurricane about an hour after he got there. The place was dry, and all the customers they did have eventually left, leaving the place empty. Tony told him that the school had gotten back to him and they postponed, he said how Ste was a lucky bastard that they agreed. The school had concluded that the broken arm was not something Ste had any control over, and it would affect his cooking. They wanted to meet him at his best, so they'd have to wait until his health was it its best.

Tony had offered his kitchen for Ste to carry on practicing, seeing as they weren't cooking for any customers, but Ste had told him he just wanted to go home. But he missed his bus. He ran as fast as he could for the damn thing, and he knew that the bus driver could see him coming in the wing mirror, but he still drove off. Couldn't even wait for five fucking seconds. So here was, his polo t-shirt soaked right through and sticking to his skin. He hadn't had time to put his hoodie on. He saw the bus coming and he legged it, hoodie and bag in hand.

Ste was cold now, and there was no point putting the jumper on, it was soaked too. He turned back to go to the restaurant, so he could find out when the next bus was due, but when he got close enough, he saw that the restaurant was all darkened up and closed. Tony must've already gone upstairs to his flat. Ste could've gone there he guessed; Tony wouldn't have exactly turn him away, but he didn't want to put the man out. He had his twins up there, and the last thing he'd want is the scally kid he took pity on, arriving at his doorstep.

Ste turned to walk back to the bus stop, but he heard someone call his name. He knew who it was; there was only one person that called him that. He pretended not to hear and continued walking. He didn't want to be feeling cold _and_ dealing with someone's cold attitude too. He didn't look back.

"Steven." Brendan called again.

He walked faster.

"Steven, wait a minute." Then he grabbed Ste's shoulder and spun him around.

Ste had to wipe away the hair sticking to his eyelids to see him clearly. He had that ever present leather jacket on, but it was zipped up for the first time. He was wearing blue jeans for once, Ste tried not to roll his eyes at the fact that they were still a dark blue. He was under an umbrella, so he was mostly dry. It was weird seeing him carry a one; Ste had him down as someone who would suck it up in the rain.

"Whaddya want, Brendan?"

"What are you doing out in the rain?"

"Fancied a walk." He turned when Brendan scoffed at him, "None of your business, Brendan." Then he headed back to the bus stop.

Brendan followed him, asked him to slow down.

"Just get lost!"

He wouldn't. He leaned against the bus shelter as Ste took his seat under it.

"You missed your bus?" He asked all safe and dry under his umbrella. Ste tried to ignore the fact that Brendan's eyes travelled over his body, and stared a little longer than appropriate at his t-shirt, clinging to his chest.

See. This was the problem. These fucking mixed messages. It was doing Ste's head in.

"No, I just thought I'd have a water fight with the sky." He pointed up, "it's winning."

"Less of the lip, Steven." He had one of those lopsided smiles on his face as he said it. It just wound Ste up.

"Or what?" He folded his arms, still clutching to his jumper. He shivered a little when Brendan walked closer to him. He blamed it on the cold.

He stopped about half a meter away. "Steven, let me take you home. I bought a car on Monday; I'll give you a ride."

Ste looked away towards some trees, observed how the leaves moved as the rain hit against them. "You mean the car you nearly decked my friend for hitting with the ball."

He didn't hear anything from Brendan, and Ste had to turn around to make sure he was still there. The older boy looked a little uncomfortable; like it wasn't something he wanted to be reminded of. "Yeah, I'm sorry about that."

"It's not me you should be apologising to."

Brendan made a low chuckling sound in his chest, before he closed the umbrella and sat down next to Ste in the bus shelter. "I'm not sorry for nearly decking him; that was a brand new car he nearly dented." He shifted in his seat, clicked his neck. "It... It seemed to bother you, and I'm sorry about _that."_

Mixed messages. MIXED MESSAGES!

"Brendan, go away."

He sighed, "Steven, the next bus isn't going to come for at least another hour or so. Not in this weather. You'll catch your death waiting for it."

"Fine." He stood up, picked up his bag and put it on his shoulder. "I'll walk." Then he left Brendan where he was seated.

He heard him mumble, "Shit" as he struggled to get his umbrella back open. "Steven, stop walking away from me."

That made him turn around. The rain was beginning to make it hard for him to keep his eyes open, but he couldn't keep his mouth closed, when he shouted, "Then stop giving me a reason to."

Brendan had managed to open his umbrella and was walking up to Ste. He stopped when he was standing in front of him. "I don't mean to."

"I came to you to apologise. After you nearly hit my friend as well_, and_ gave me a death glare across the park. I came to you after you screamed at me to get out of your car. I came to you after I made a massive fool of myself. Do you know how much courage that took for me to do? You were so angry after, and I still came to you." Ste sighed and dropped his bag on the ground. Right there, in the middle of the streets. He was glad that it was raining. It meant the area was deserted, and the sound of the rain would block out his voice from travelling through windows. He was exhausted. Exhausted with not knowing where he stood. "And you treated me like crap. I told you I was confused, and you told me to go ask out a girl. Like I can fuck the confusion right out of me."

"I..." He took a deep breath, his cheek twitched a little. "I didn't want you to sleep with her, okay."

He was missing the point. Ste picked up his bag and walked away from him again. He knew that Brendan was still following him. "What are you doing out here, anyway? Isn't your girlfriend waiting for you?"

"I saw you standing outside the restaurant all soaked. I told Katy, my boss, that I'd be back, and I was going to drop a mate off home because they were stranded in the rain."

"We're not mates, Brendan." They never really were; Brendan was deceiving him from day one.

"And I don't have a girlfriend."

Ste turned his head for a second to look at him, he could easily catch up with Ste, but he was purposely staying back. Giving Ste space. "Ha! Thought someone as macho as you would have a girl on both arms. Or maybe one on your dick, and one on your mouth."

Brendan grabbed him then, and shoved him to the side of some building. They were hidden from view; nobody would see them here, not unless they were looking for them. This was it; the crude comment was finally what was going to make Brendan hit him.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" He wasn't pissed, just annoyed. "Since when did you start speaking like some kind of stoned frat boy?" Ste rolled his eyes and tried to get away from him. But Brendan put an arm across Ste's chest, stopping him. "You know Anne isn't my girlfriend. She and I went to buy myself a car. That's why I was in a suit. We went to some pretentious as fuck place. And the park, she... She just had something she wanted to talk to me about. And she didn't want to do it where there were people around."

Ste didn't realise how much he needed that explanation up until that point. "Well, that was a really interesting story. I'm gonna go home and repeat it to the neighbour's kids. So, if you'll excuse me." Then he shoved Brendan, managing to get loose from him, and got back on to the streets. Brendan wasn't letting up.

"Are you seriously going to walk home in this weather?" He asked, exasperated.

Ste ignored him.

They were near the woods soon and Ste walked in, maybe he could lose Brendan in the trees. There was a short cut to his house through here, that's how he discovered the spot by the river. He just didn't take the cut very often. It creeped him out. But he felt a sense of safety with Brendan following behind. Funny eh, how Brendan, the guy who wanted revenge on his brother, made him feel safe.

He was walking fast when he tripped over a tree root that had come out of the ground, and Brendan just about managed to grab onto him before he fell completely.

The older boy sighed. "At least take my jacket. That t-shirt is ridiculously thin; you might as well not be wearing anything."

"Will you leave me alone if I do?" He crossed his arm, as if that would show that he meant it.

Brendan put his three middle fingers up to the side of his forehead and smiled, "scout's honour."

Ste bit his bottom lip, not sure if he should believe him. He didn't miss the way Brendan's gaze shifted to his lips as his teeth pressed into the bottom one. It wasn't long before Brendan's eyes dragged back up to meet his. Ste nodded and Brendan unzipped his jacket, shuffled out of one arm, then moved his umbrella to his other hand, so he could shuffle out of the other too. He passed it to Ste, and Ste just put on his shoulder, he couldn't be bothered to try to push the massive cast though the sleeve. The jacket was warm from Brendan's body heat, but it was Brendan's scent on the jacket that made him feel heat spread across his body.

"Ain't you going to be cold now?" He asked. All Brendan had on was a black sweater that probably wasn't that thick.

Brendan smiled and walked closer to him. He reached out and swept away a clunk of hair that was stuck to Ste's forehead. "I'm a little drier than you are. I'll survive."

Ste swallowed down to settle that feeling in his stomach. The one he now knew was butterflies. For fuck's sake, he wasn't a fourteen year old girl. Blokes aren't meant to get butterflies. Especially not over other blokes.

"Well, go then." Ste told him. He wanted him gone before he did something really dumb, like kiss him again and actually get a punch this time.

Brendan didn't move, he looked at a water droplet that was just below Ste's left ear, and the older boy followed its slow movement down his neck, over his collar bone before it disappeared into his t-shirt. Brendan swallowed. "Did… did you ask out Douglas?"

He was still staring at the spot the water droplet was, before it went missing.

Ste rolled his eyes and told him he was going home, and how Brendan had promised that he'd leave him alone if he took the jacket off him. But as he had his back to him, he felt the older boy's finger hook into his rear pocket and pull him back. His back wasn't on Brendan's chest, but he could feel the heat of Brendan's mouth on the nape of his neck.

"Please just... Just answer me that. Did you ask him out?"

Ste's voice shook a little when he asked, "Would it matter?"

"It'd matter." It was barely above a whisper and after, he didn't know if it was Brendan's breath that was licking over the skin at the back of his neck, or if it was Brendan's tongue.

He soon figured it out.

Brendan's mouth closed over the nape of his neck, and his tongue worked it like it was his mouth, or his ear, or something else. Something he'd never thought of a guy doing to him before. And no one had ever done _this_ to him, made him feel so aroused by simply having their tongue on his neck. Ste dropped his bag and hoodie, and bowed his head forward, so Brendan could have access to more skin, and he took it, he made circling motions over Ste's skin, massaged it. His finger unhooked itself from Ste's back pocket and moved to his stomach to push his arse back. Right over the bulge in Brendan's pants, and he pressed him against it. Hard. He didn't even notice that he groaned until he heard Brendan chuckle a little, before he placed a small kiss on the spot he had just assaulted with his tongue.

"You didn't answer my question."

"No." He didn't know if he said it out loud or if Brendan even understood it, he was breathing so heavily.

But he must've voiced it, and Brendan must've heard it, because he swiped his tongue from the back of his neck to the side of it, sucked it hard before he moved the hand he had on Ste's stomach to his chest, then higher, lifting his head up. Brendan shifted a little where he was standing, so that he had easier access to Ste's Adam's apple. He wrapped his tongue around it, licked it, sucked it, worshipped it.

He placed a small kiss on his jaw and bit it the tiniest bit, before Ste lowered his head and looked straight into Brendan's eyes. They were the darkest he'd ever seen them, all clouded over with lust. And when he looked back at Ste, he finally pressed their lips together. His mouth was hot and he used his thumb to press down on Ste's chin to get him to open it, and when he did, Brendan swiped his tongue inside. It sent shivers down Ste's spine, and he turned around, so they were chest to chest, before he lifted his arms up, both of them, cast and all, and wrapped them around Brendan's neck and pulled him in closer.

The jacket fell from his shoulder and Brendan let go of the umbrella. One of his hands gripped onto Ste's hips and pressed himself hard into Ste. Ste moaned into Brendan's mouth and this time Brendan didn't chuckle. He made a sort of growling sound of his own. With his other hand, he drew his fingers through Ste's dripping hair, and tried to draw him closer in, like their kiss wasn't carnal enough. Their mouths slipped over each other, both their lips slick from saliva or rain, who knew?

Ste pressed closer into Brendan as the older boy sucked rain off of his bottom lip. He placed his forehead against Ste's for a moment to catch his breath, then he kissed the raindrops off of his eyelashes, below his eyes, his cheekbones, the corner of his mouth, his jaw, his collar bone, the spot the raindrop had disappeared earlier. And finally he nibbled on his ear.

Ste made a breathy sound, he might've said Brendan's name, but whatever it was, it had the older boy pushing him back against a tree and lifting him off the ground. He instantly wrapped both legs around Brendan, and Brendan ground into him, his mouth hot and open on Ste's again. His hands were all over him, and at some point, they reached the hem of his soaked t-shirt, and that was the only time they broke away, for Brendan to haul the t-shirt off over his head. Then Brendan's mouth was on Ste's neck, and Ste was tugging at his hair. He had never felt anything like this before; he didn't know what to do other than cling on for dear life. He moved his hips along with Brendan's, making the older boy groan into his neck and grip harder onto his flesh.

Then there was another sound. It was a dog. Just running past them, but it was enough to make Brendan freeze. His whole body stiffened, and then they heard someone call after the dog. Brendan was off of Ste, like he had just stung the older boy. He was all wide eyed and in shock. He picked up Ste's t-shirt and threw it at him, told him to put it on.

"Brendan." Ste called out as Brendan bent down to pick up his jacket.

"You still want this? No, I don't suppose you do. It's all wet and muddy now." He scratched the top of his head and looked around, he looked manic. "So erm, I erm," he laughed a little. "This. This didn't happen."

"What?" Ste could not believe what he was hearing. Brendan's lips were red and swollen. Ste's own lips had an ache to it, and he had no doubt they were in the same state as Brendan's. His face burnt from where Brendan's stubbles had rubbed against his skin. Ste had a major hard on, and if Brendan's pants were anything to go by, so did he. This fucking happened. Whether Brendan like it or not.

"Steven, this didn't fucking happen. I'm not queer, okay."

"Your tongue down my throat and hard dick grinding against mine, says something else." Ste aggressively put his t-shirt back on. Brendan had to be kidding him right now.

He came up into Ste's face and snarled at him. "Keep your fucking voice down, there someone out here."

Ste pushed him as hard as he could and picked up his stuff from the ground. "I don't fucking care, Brendan."

"Well, I do. This, this was a mistake. I wasn't thinking straight."

Ste dropped all his stuff again, and this time it was his turn to get in Brendan's face. "Are you drunk?"

"What, no."

"Are you high?"

"No."

"Then what exactly is it that's not making you think straight?"

Brendan bent his head down closer to Ste's, so their noses were practically touching, when he barked, "YOU!"

Ste had nothing he could say to that. He felt exactly the same way about Brendan. Brendan was well and truly fucking with his head. So all Ste could conjure up was, "now who's raising their voice?"

Brendan shook his head and went round to pick up Ste's stuff for him, and thrust everything into his arms. "You, you forget this ever happened, okay. In fact, forget about me." He put on his wet jacket and zipped it over the sweater that was clinging to his body, the body that had been pressing into Ste only moments ago, radiating heat into him.

"I don't want to." Ste whispered. He wasn't even speaking to Brendan, not really. But he heard anyway.

"You have to." He snapped his fingers in front of Ste's face when Ste refused to look at him, "hey, hey." Finally Ste looked up. "I'm not gay. But you and I, we're just messing with each other's heads. So it's better if we just never see each other again. I mean, a few weeks ago we weren't even aware of each other's existence." He had a desperate look on his face, like he needed to get through to him.

Ste just hoped that if he cried, Brendan wouldn't be able to tell because of the rain. He didn't want to cry over a Brady, and he definitely didn't want a Brady knowing he was crying over them.

"Why are you doing this?" He wasn't asking about Brendan forcing him to forget what had just happened between them. He was asking about it all. Why did Brendan have to drag Ste into his world, all to get back at his brother? Why did he let things get this far?

He was angry now, Brendan was. He closed his eyes and breathed heavily through his nose. He used the heel of his hands to rub his eyes before he said, "Forget this happened. I mean it."

Then he turned and walked away.

"Don't walk away from me, Brendan." His voice had a telltale crack to it. He was repeating what Brendan had told him not to do earlier, but Brendan didn't stop to turn around like he had.

He still had his back to him, and he was still walking away when he called out, "goodbye, Steven."

Then Ste lost him in the trees. The sun was starting to set, and it was getting dark in the woods. The trees weren't allowing much light to come through, and Ste was left there, alone. He tried to call out for Brendan again, but he choked on his words and it came out as half a sob and only audible to his own ears. At least Brendan wasn't here to see what was suspiciously like tears streaming down his face. Ste could convince himself that it was just the rain against his skin, not real tears, and the sting behind his eyes was from the rain hitting against them.

He was not, would not cry over Brendan.

Brendan, who had not just left him alone in the darkening woods, but alone in this confusion to figure his own way out.

And the only physical evidence he had that Brendan was even here, was his umbrella lying on the ground.


	13. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13**

"I'm sorry; you said you were going to be gone for an hour. Not several." Katy was speaking to Brendan from out front in the bar as he walked in through the back door.

He didn't reply to her, he didn't even go to the bar to finish off his shift. Instead he took a seat at the bottom of the staircase and just stared at the wall ahead of him. He was still trying to wrap his head round what he had just done. That wasn't supposed to happen. He went up to the boy with the sincere intention to offer him a ride in the rain. Perhaps apologise for his abrupt manner the last time they spoke. And maybe he thought he could somehow, possibly slip in the question as to whether Steven did ask out Douglas, but never in a million years had he foreseen what had actually happened.

This time, this time it wasn't Steven who made the move. It was all on him. And still he managed to find a way to blame it all on the boy. It _was_ his fault. It must be. Brendan wasn't like this for anyone else. No girl, forget any boy, ever lingered in his mind twenty four effing seven, especially when said boy should be the last person on his mind. Brendan didn't even know how he went from passing Steven his jacket, to sucking on his neck. It made no sense, the chain of events was just a messed up raging ball of illogicality.

For a moment though, everything did make sense. When he was with Steven, he wasn't thinking about the bigger picture. He wasn't thinking about Cheryl, or who Steven's brother was. It was just them two, and everything in his head ceased. Even just for a moment, he thought of nothing but Steven, and the world didn't matter. And that was okay. In fact, it was great. It's just when the world came tumbling down on top of him did he realise how wrong it all was. That it wasn't just them, that there were other people involved. That what they were doing didn't just go against nature, and God's intent, but it went against everything he thought he was about. He thought his purpose was to protect his sister, yet if she found out what he'd been doing, what he was feeling, then he'd be the one stabbing her in the chest.

And his father. His father would glow in the satisfaction of knowing he was right about his son after all. That his son wasn't a man; he was a queer, a poof, a disgusting, little faggot. Then he'd curl his top lip the way it did, and he'd moisten his lips and show Brendan what happened to dirty little queers.

"Brendan, what the hell happened to you?" Katy was standing over him and she looked like she was staring at Brendan's corpse.

She might as well have been, if anyone saw what happened in the woods, then his father would find out. And he swore, Brendan promised himself that if his father laid a hand on him again, it'd be the last time. He wouldn't stick around for it to happen again.

"I...I lost your umbrella, I'm sorry." He looked down at his hands as he spoke, they wouldn't stop shaking. Why wouldn't they just stay still?!

"ANNE! Get down here." Katy called out to her niece as she bent down and unzipped Brendan's jacket for him. "Anne, for Christ's sake, I need you to mind the bar." She pushed the jacket down out of his arms and put it to a side, as she tried to haul a still dazed Brendan up. The woman was half his size, but she was surprisingly strong when she was determined. Or maybe it was just that Brendan wanted someone else to help him, just once.

Anne was at the top when Katy got him half way up the stairs. She asked if he was okay, but Katy told her that she could talk to Brendan later, right now she had punters that needed serving. Anne was hesitant to go down, but a stern look from her aunt had her walking down the stairs.

Katy led him into the bathroom and turned on the hot water in her bathtub. As it filled up, she sat him on the edge of the tub and pulled off Brendan's sweater and put it to a side. Then she bent down, crouching on the ground and looked up at Brendan who was still observing his damn shaking hands. She placed her steadier ones over his.

"Brendan." She spoke softly, as if afraid to startle him. As if he was a child. "Hey kid, what happened to you?"

Brendan smiled a little, it had no humour. He called Steven that. Kid. It was all relative, wasn't it? Being children. Steven was a kid to him, and he was a kid to Katy. But between Steven and Brendan, Brendan was probably the child. The boy, who had to grow up too fast, so didn't get a chance to grow up at all. To this day he was an eight year old boy, trapped in a man's body. That's why it was so easy for his father to influence every aspect of his life. The way he dressed. Colours would make him look like a pansy. The way he held himself. He wasn't allowed to walk like a faggot. The sound of his voice. Gruff, because anything else would make him sound like a little girl.

That's why it was so easy for Brendan to feel like he could disintegrate into a thousand little black birds, all chained around the neck. They had the wings to leave; they just didn't have the power. That chain was always going to keep them trapped. Brendan was never going to move on; he was going to be bound to those memories forever. Every single memory was its own black bird, and the manacles, they were his veins. There was only ever going to be one way to set those black birds free, and that was to cut the chain.

Or that's what he thought. When he was with Steven, those birds didn't have to be free, they didn't exist at all. For those moments when he could feel Steven's heart thumping against his chest, he was just there in the moment. There was no thinking about the past, and there was no thinking beyond the fact that Steven's breath was his own. Brendan's veins ran pure, and with a new kind of rush he'd never felt before, it flushed out everything he thought he was. It flushed out the freak within him. Just for those moments.

Then he heard the dog bark, and the rain, the rain that was pounding down on them started to feel like nettles against his skin. And when he heard a man calling after the dog, the nettles ripped through the sanctuary he found in Steven's arms and poisoned it with the memory of who he really was, what he was really doing.

Brendan's smile to Katy turned into a low rumble of laughter, before it was almost a full on guffaw. He took his hands out from under hers and rubbed his face with them. Katy looked a little worried.

"Honestly, Katy, that is one question, I am dying to know the answer to." He brought his hands down and gripped her shoulders, "you think you can answer that for me?" He didn't know if he was frightening her, he hoped not, but he was acting like a crazy person. She stood up and he instantaneously let his hands fall. He thought she was going to leave then, that he'd scared her away. But instead she sat next to him, and he turned to look at her with pleading eyes. "I'm begging you, "he said. "Tell me what is wrong with me."

"Brendan, you sweet child. I don't know where you went, when you disappeared into the rain. I don't know what you did. But there is nothing, and I mean _nothing_ wrong with you." She leaned forward and kissed him on the forehead, before she reached behind him and turned off the tap. Katy looked at him that way most people did, like he was this huge puzzle and little pieces of it had fallen into some crevice they wouldn't be able to reach. That he would remain this incomplete picture forever, no amount of pondering would ever make them figure out what those missing pieces were.

"Katy, do you sometimes think that there's something not right with me?" Brendan lifted a shaky finger to his temple. "You know, up here?"

Katy clasped her hands around his, and brought his hand down. She gave him a smile that reminded him of the ones his mother used to give him, or the ones Maggie did. "One time, when Maggie's cancer had reached her bones and she couldn't walk anymore, she asked me to take her to this beach. And she made me wrap up loads of seedless strawberry jam sandwiches in a hamper. Told me that if I could lure you to a day out with her, this would be the way. So I did, and it worked, you remember?"

Brendan smiled a little and nodded. He remembered the day. He wanted to go out with the lads to some club across town, and Katy had come into his room, armed with about ten sandwiches in a hamper and asked if he wanted a trip to the beach. He didn't want to spend the day with three females, who'd make him want to tear his innards out from the torture of their inane chatter. And he told Katy exactly that. But then Maggie had asked to see him, and she told him that she'd really like to spend some time with him. Just him.

Katy carried on with her story, "So anyway, we got into the car, and Cheryl was at some party or the other, so she didn't come along. And the entire way, Maggie kept asking you, if you knew that she really loved you. That she was sorry she stopped you from going Uni. And she was sorry that your father left your mother for her. And that she tried to be a good Ma to you. She tried to treat you like she treated Cheryl. And you were telling her to hush. That she had nothing to be sorry about. That you thought she was more to you, than you deserved." Maggie rubbed the back of Brendan's hand, and he could see her eyes tearing up at the memory. "I swear to god, you could've killed us all then. My eyes were all teary and I couldn't see a damned thing in the road." She laughed a little after that and stroked his cheek, like he was that teenager losing his stepmother all over again.

"On the beach I waited in the car while you rolled her wheelchair along the rocky beach. And she had laughed with you; I hadn't seen her do that in a long time. And when you guys got back, and you had gone off to the little shop to get Cheryl a trinket, she told me that she'd never forgive herself for letting you grow up thinking that you were different. That you were different to Cheryl. That you were different to the boys in school." Katy smiled that sad smile she did whenever she talked about her best friend. Then she lowered her voice, "She said she'd never forgive herself for not making you believe that you were normal. That she didn't try harder to make you tell her why you felt that way. She'd never forgive herself for being selfish and ignoring your fights and your arrests and all the trouble you got into, as your cries for help. She said it made her feel like a failure that you needed help at all."

Katy had a tear streaming down her face, and he wanted to tell her to shut up, that he didn't want to hear anymore. But she didn't stop. "She made me promise that I'd take care of you after she was gone. She made me promise that I'd do whatever I could, to make you, not_ feel_ like you're normal, that I'd make sure you _know_ that you are."

Brendan wiped her tear away for her and asked her with a small smile, what the point of her anecdote was. And she told him that she failed Maggie. That if he was asking her if there was something wrong with him up there, she hadn't kept her promise to her best friends. She hadn't made him believe that there was nothing wrong with him. And she was afraid that she was never going to be able to achieve that, because it was so ingrained into him. That before he was a man, before he was a brother, a son, a friend, he thought of himself - first and foremost- as an anomaly in the world.

Brendan told her he was sorry he made her feel like a failure, that he made Maggie die feeling like one too. It was never his desire to be a burden on them, on anyone.

He was missing the point according to Katy.

"For such a smart boy, sometimes you can be so dumb." She held his face in both her hands, "you have never been a burden to us. Never. No matter what you think of yourself, no matter what's going on in your head, you have been nothing but a gift to your mother, your stepmother, Cheryl, Anne, and you know she eats men for breakfast." She gave him a watery eyed, toothy smile, "to me. You're the son I never had… What is it going to take for you to talk to me?"

He didn't miss the fact that his father was not on that list.

Brendan gently removed her hands from his face and stood up. He needed to wash his face; he needed to wash away the events of the day. He needed to wash Steven off of him, before the boy's scent seeped through his skin and entered his blood, transfused itself into every atom of his being. He couldn't let Steven have that much power over him.

He washed his face with cold water and held on to the basin as he looked at his reflection in the mirror. He still looked the same. He still looked like the guy who had slept with women, who had prioritised his sister, who was a hard man. He still looked like Brendan Brady. Why did he feel so weak? Why did he feel like that his entire act of a life was crashing down on him? The rubbles of his former self were scattered at his feet, and the raw actuality of his existence burnt at its first contact with the harsh air of a world he wasn't ready for.

He needed to pick up the pieces and put himself back together. He just prayed no one would see the cracks.

"I'll be fine," he said, still observing his reflection. He was talking to himself, but he turned around and smiled. It was the one he used to practise in his bedroom mirror as a child. "Katy, honestly, that was me just freaking out over nothing. There was a kid I nearly hit with my car, and it freaked me out a little. Could've killed the thing."

Katy sighed, and slowly stood up from where she was still sitting at the edge of the bath tub. She walked to the door, and turned to him before he left. "I understand it's hard for you to open up, Brendan. But please do me the courtesy of not lying to me."

She was right. It was one thing to not tell her anything, it was another to insult her intelligence by blatantly lying to her. "I'm sorry."

She made a humming sound and told him that he should turn on the hot water tap again for a little while, because his bath water probably had gone cold. She'd leave some clothes that Anne's male friends had left behind, in the spare bedroom for him. That way she could throw his clothes in the dryer, and he wouldn't have to walk around naked while he waited for them. Then she left him alone in the bathroom, and for a while he didn't know what to do. He just stood there and stared at his surroundings.

Eventually he slipped off his shoes and socks, unbuckled his jeans and slipped out of them along with his underwear, putting them with where his sweater was, and sank into the tub. Katy was right; the water had gone slightly cold. Maybe not by normal people's standard, the water temperature probably would've been perfect for the average person. But Brendan liked his water scalding hot, almost like the heat of the water could peel his skin off, purify him. Brendan reached up with his toes and turned the hot water back on, until the water got so hot, his skin turned a flush pink.

Then his closed his eyes, bent his knees, and allowed himself to sink until his head was under the water. Then Steven flooded his mind.

He asked about Douglas. He hadn't even noticed his finger reaching out and hooking the boy's back pocket. His brain had no authority over his actions when it came to Steven; that much was obvious. Everything was instinct. Everything was natural. He didn't have to think. That was a joke though, right? That was someone up there playing a prank on him. A sick and twisted game. How can something so wrong have felt, as the cliché says, so right? What he felt towards Ste, what they did in the woods, that wasn't natural. So why did his body act by itself, why didn't it let him think and stop?

He had drawn Steven closer to him because he needed the boy near; he needed for him to ease his mind about Douglas, or even Rae. After the boy had left him a couple of nights ago, he couldn't get the image of Steven's lips against those of the little American's. It shouldn't have mattered to him. If Steven wanted to pursue Douglas to help him make sense of what had happened between them, then that was his initiative. Brendan had no right chewing his fingers raw over it, silently pleading that Steven was just messing with him. That Steven could hear him across the distance between them, and assure him somehow that Brendan was just being paranoid.

He didn't have any right to be though. He'd denied kissing the boy back, he turned the boy away, and he refused to acknowledge what had happened. Steven didn't have to answer him.

He hadn't at first. Instead he asked him if it'd matter. And for the first time since the incident in the car, Brendan had been painfully honest to Steven and himself when he told him it did. But once he admitted that, his body acted by itself again, he needed to show Steven just how much it did matter. His tongue reached out and touched his skin where a tiny raindrop had found itself a home at the back of his neck. Then his hair let more droplets fall, and they looked like diamonds bestowed upon his skin. And Brendan closed his mouth over them. Licked them, sucked at them, drank them like he was a man stranded in a desert, and Steven was gifting him an oasis.

Then Steven made a sound, it should've freaked him out. Groans and moans weren't something that he wasn't used to. But Steven's was too deep, too male, and that should've been enough to kick his brain back into action. But the sound had vibrated through the boy and into Brendan, heightening all his senses. He couldn't help himself from chuckling at the boy's sound. He had Steven so turned on, and he hadn't even kissed his mouth. That had been crazy thinking though; he wasn't going to kiss Steven's mouth, because _this_ was crazy, off the rails. Brendan always knew something in his head was loose, and it was confirmed when he had the boy's arse grinding against his crotch, pressing into him, hard.

When Brendan woke up that morning, he hadn't seen any of this coming.

He had asked Steven again about Douglas. He didn't really hear Steven answer him. The rain was beating heavily, and the boy's words were to heavily coat by lust. But he saw his mouth move; he saw the bump in Steven's neck glide under his skin, and he felt the words quiver in Steven's stomach as they left his mouth. Then Brendan was back on him, sweeping his tongue to Steven's pulse, he wanted to feel the boy's erratic beat, know what he was doing to him. It made him feel some power in a powerless situation, a situation where he knew Steven had the upper hand.

And finally, finally he had managed to taste, savour the thing that had fascinated him for so long. He closed his mouth over Steven's Adam's apple, and wordlessly apologised into his skin for not just sending him away the other night, but for the promises he made his sister. He didn't know back then, that with his plan to tear the Hay boys apart, Steven would make him feel something that had been torn out of _him_ a long time ago. The idea that the world wasn't all bad.

He had kissed the boy on his jaw, and it was the first indication of affection he had given him all day. It wasn't a move coerced by lust or fascination. It was simply Brendan kissing him. Softly. And that was probably the worst move he had made. He wasn't not supposed to feel affection for this boy, much less show it. Brendan had bitten him, just a little, and frankly he did it because he could. Because he had Steven in his arms.

But then the boy looked at him and everything had sped up.

He had his mouth latched onto Steven's, and his tongue in his mouth. He tried that thing he'd imagined doing since the night in the car, he tried to suck the sweetness right off it. And he couldn't get enough; he pulled the boy's mouth tighter against his and let the world drop beneath their feet. And when they parted for air, Brendan placed his forehead against Steven's, he needed skin on skin. He needed Steven as close as possible. Then he had left a trail of tiny kisses in all the places he had found himself staring at in the past, just small moments of his lips leaving a mark of their own on Steven's skin. And when he teethed Steven's earlobes, the boy gasped, and the sound was like an electric shudder through him.

He had the boy backed against something, he didn't know what. Last he knew, they were in the woods, so it was probably a tree. He didn't care; he needed the boy pressed into him as close as possible. Like they could be moulded into one being. He had Steven's legs wrapped around his waist, and he was grinding into him. His mind was still on shut down, nothing existed other than that moment. He had Steven's t-shirt over his head and his hands all over his skin. He hadn't realised how much he wanted to touch him. The boy had painfully pulled at his hair, but he liked it. It kept it real. It meant it wasn't a dream.

Then there was a knocking… wait.

Brendan lifted his head out of the water with a gasp, and the image of Steven dripped away like the water running down his face. There was someone knocking on the bathroom door.

He was still breathing, which meant he hadn't been underwater for that long, who the hell was bothering him?

They knocked again.

"Brendan?" It was Anne.

"Your aunt send you?" He asked as he wiped his face of the remaining water with his hands.

"No. Why would my aunt need to send me?"

He sat himself upright in the tub. This thing was definitely fitted in with the purpose of only the two small women living here using it. "What do you want, Anne?"

"Did something happen?"

He looked towards the door, as if he could see her through it. It was unlocked, so he was grateful that she had some boundaries. "Like what?"

"Like with Ste? Did you guys get into another fight?"

After Steven had left the other night, and he had smashed the vase, she had come running up to see what was wrong. She asked him what happened, and Brendan had told her that he messed up, like he always did. She enquired if Steven had found out who he was, and if that was the problem, and had Brendan laughed, said that he had so many problems. Then he went to fetch the dustpan.

"What makes you think it has anything to do with Steven?"

"Because when you rushed off into the rain, I saw you going after him from the upstairs window."

Brendan didn't answer. What was he going to say to that?

"Did he find out, now? Is that why you were all shaken up? Because he's angry?"

"No, he doesn't know." If he did, it wouldn't have been his hair Steven was pulling at, it would've been his bowels.

"Maybe you should tell him. He'll soon find out, and it'd be best coming from you."

"Maybe you should stop talking to me, while I sit in, what can only be described as a baby bath, butt naked." He needed her to stop question him on Steven. It wasn't a subject he could put into words.

"Brendan, don't push me away."

That was enough. He climbed out of the bathtub and grabbed a towel, dried himself, then wrapped it around his waist before opening the door. Anne was sitting on the floor, her back had been against the door, so when he opened it, she fell back. He had to take a couple of steps away, so she wouldn't fall on him, yet she still managed to tug on his towel, making the thing fall over her face as she lay flat on her back on the bathroom floor.

"Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod!" Anne recited, flapping her hands about.

This was an interesting situation he found himself in. He started laughing while Anne remained panicked on the floor. There were footsteps coming towards the bathroom, so he told Anne to keep her eyes closed as he bent down and picked up the towel from over her head. He barely had the thing wrapped around him when Katy was standing in the doorway.

This was awkward. Brendan was fastening his towel, and her niece was on the ground, with her eyes open. It looked like they were playing a special kind of game of _show and tell_.

"Do I even want to know what is going on?" Katy asked, with her eyebrows so far up on her forehead, they could've got lost in her head of hair.

Brendan grinned, "Anne saw my thingamajig and got freaked out by the size of it."

Katy sucked her cheeks in slightly to stop herself from laughing, "your thingamajig?"

"It's a technical term."

"For a six year old."

Anne was standing up now, and she shoved at Brendan's shoulder and dusted herself down. "I didn't see anything. I was leaning against the door and he opened it."

"Conspiracy." Brendan nodded, and Anne shoved him again.

"Glad to see the bath worked to get you out of your funk." She smiled, and then turned to head back down, speaking as she went, "play nice, children… And keep it PG."

Brendan rolled his eyes and went back to the tub to pull the plug on the drain. He watched the water swirl in to the little hole, leaving him in a trance like state. Thoughts of Steven were starting to saturate his thoughts again, so when he heard Anne move behind him, he turned and walked past her, into the spare bedroom to see what the pub landlady had laid out for him. It wasn't too bad he guessed, bit on the small side for him, but he pulled the dark purple hoodie over his head anyway. Beggars couldn't be choosers. It reminded him of the one Steven had been holding onto in the rain. He could rid of that thought from his mind, as he pulled the hood down from his head.

Katy even left him boxers. Forget that. He was not wearing the underwear of some randomer Anne had brought home. How does someone even forget their underwear? Next, he pulled the sweatpants on. The clothes must've belonged to someone Anne had stay over a few times, nobody just left their pants behind.

"So are you gonna do it?" Anne was back in his face. Technically she had just walked into the room, but metaphorically, she was all up in his grill.

"Do what?" He asked, knowing what she meant, as he sat on the edge of the bed.

"Tell Ste." She sat down next to him and passed him his shoes. He hadn't even known she carried them in with her. "If he hears it from anyone else, imagine how upset he'll be. And he _will _find out."

He placed his footwear on the ground and ignored them as he pushed himself higher up on the bed and crossed his legs. "I'm not planning on hanging out with him again."

"Why not?" She asked him, turning her body, so she could look at him better. She had a frown on her face.

Brendan shrugged as a response.

"If you care about him, you'd-"

"Nobody said I cared about him." He interrupted her. He was sure he never said that.

She rolled her eyes. "Whatever." She also pushed herself up on the bed, but unlike Brendan, she laid herself down. "You owe him this explanation."

"Explanation?"

"Why you're being cold with him. If he knew the truth, he might understand."

Brendan lay down beside her, "what makes you think I'm being cold?"

She chuckled a little before answering, "because you're Brendan Brady. You're temperature is always set to frosty. And you don't smash a vase after having a warm and fluffy conversation with someone."

Maybe he should tell Steven. Then Steven would definitely stay away from him. Brendan wouldn't be left feeling guilty as he walked away from him, because Steven would send him packing. The boy would get whatever idea he had about them out of his head, and the lines would be defined again. He told the boy he didn't want to see him again, and this'd keep him away.

"Maybe I will." He turned his head to face hers at the exact time she turned her's to face him. "Tell him, that is."

She smiled at him. God, when did her teeth get so white? "Really?"

"Mhmm." He'd do it. And he'd ignore the voice telling him that he wanted Steven to understand. Steven was to stay away from him.

"Brendan?"

"Hmm?" His eyelids were getting heavy. The light in this room was too dim. He needed to go home. He needed to figure out if he'd approach Steven, and how he'd do it. He left the boy in the woods for Christ's sake.

"You falling asleep?" Her voice sounded distant. Like he was hearing it from another world.

Brendan might've made a noise that sounded like no, but he wasn't sure. He fell asleep.

Xxx

He was up and back at his place before midnight. He had slept for a couple hours, but he needed to get home. He needed to be in his own clothes, and ones that hadn't had Steven clawing at them. He didn't get back to sleep straight away when he was in his own bed; he had too many thoughts running around in his head. He told Anne that he was going to tell Steven who he was. He didn't know if he had meant it, but she was right. He was going to find out sooner or later, and that meant Steven would inevitably be more hurt than Brendan had already left him. Of course by then, he could claim he didn't owe Steven an explanation, that he didn't owe that family a damn thing.

He'd be kidding himself though. And whether Ste wanted to hear Brendan out or not, Brendan needed him to understand. As much as he claimed he didn't care, Steven had to understand.

That's why he found himself cruising around Steven's estate the next evening, going over and over in his head if he should do this. It'd mean Steven would never want to see him again, and that was what he told Steven he wanted. But it'd also mean Steven would hate him. Brendan may have told the boy that he didn't want to be around him again, but he didn't want Steven to despise him for what he did or who he was.

He stopped his car, just outside the estate entrance, where he could see the Hays front door from where he parked. He had his phone out, preparing to call the boy, but not having the balls to do it. His finger just hovered over the call button, like it was a decision between the blue pill and the red pill. He could pick the blue one, go home and just avoid any confrontation with the boy. They'd eventually see each other in court, but by then Steven might have forgotten Brendan and whatever it was that was going on between them. Or he could pick the red pill and press dial, face the consequences, tell Steven the truth, regardless of what the outcome was.

For once in his life, he was going to do the right thing, he picked red.

The phone rang out.

Again.

And again.

Steven didn't want to know. He asked Brendan to stay with him the day before, and when he walked away, he did so permanently. Brendan was about to try one more time, just in case, but his phone slipped out of his hand and he slid down in his seat, so he was hidden, . He saw Joseph Hay stepping out of the Hay household, the older Hay walked past his car without a second thought and disappeared when he turned a corner.

He could knock on the front door to see if Steven was in; there wasn't a risk of Joseph opening the door for him. Brendan didn't let himself think for too long and risk the chance of bottling it, when he opened his car door and headed towards Steven's house. He ignored the fact that he probably would've had more luck if he went to the restaurant Steven worked at. The boy was probably not even home.

Brendan opened the gate and stepped into the front yard, overlooking the fact that he was at the Hay home looking for the wrong brother. He was about to knock on the front door, when the corner of his eyes caught some movement in the house through the net curtains that covered the living room windows from the inside. Brendan walked over to it to have a closer look, if it was Steven, he could just knock on the window.

It wasn't, though. It was some older man. He couldn't see him clearly enough, but he had a beer gut on him, and he was lounging on a sofa chair with his feet up on the coffee table. Steven was home, he could hear the man calling for him, asking the boy to get him another beer. He couldn't hear what Steven replied back, he wasn't in the room, but the man who must've been Terry told him to repeat himself. Well, not exactly told, he shouted at Steven to say that to his fucking face.

Then Steven was there. At the living room door. He hated and appreciated the net covering the window; it covered him from being noticed, but it also meant he couldn't see Steven clearly.

"I said, Joey has gone to get some more, if you're so fucking thirsty, go get it yourself." Steven told the man. By the look on Terry's face, it was obvious Steven didn't talk back too often, and it wasn't something that sat well with him.

Terry stood up and walked towards the boy, and Brendan knew what was coming even before the man moved. He'd seen that look on his own father before. That disdain and disbelief that their position of power was being challenged. Brendan should've moved faster, but before he could, Terry had raised his fist and slammed it into Steven's face.

Brendan began pounding at the front door, but it didn't stop Steven's stepfather pounding into him. He could hear the boy's yelps of pain through the door. By instinct, Brendan took a few steps back and hammered his shoulder into the door, bursting it open. He ran to where Steven was, and his presence had frozen the older man's fists, halfway down to another punch. Brendan grabbed the man by his t-shirt and slammed him against a wall, where a frame fell off it. He punched Steven's stepfather across the face, once, twice, more. He lost count.

He shouldn't have hurt Steven. He shouldn't have.

He heard Steven somewhere in the background telling him to stop, begging him. But all he could see was red, and the blood in his ears was drowning out Steven's voice. He eventually stopped punching the man, and instead he gripped his hand around his throat and squeezed. Squeezed it like it wasn't even a human being he was killing here. He was squeezing out the breaths the man took every time he laid a hand on Steven, every time he made Steven feel worthless. For every moment he was in Steven's life. He was squeezing it all out.

Then there was a hand over his wrists, and it was pulling his own hand away from the throat he was clutching. He turned and saw Steven who had his eyes wide and tears streaming down his face.

He let go.

Terry took a large gasp of air and slid down the wall, to the floor, grasping onto his neck. He was calling Brendan a psycho, and a freak. Steven was just staring at him with wide eyes, and Brendan couldn't tear his own eyes away from the boy's. Eventually Terry stood up and told Steven to get his faggot boyfriend out of his house, and when Brendan winced at the word, only then did Steven look away.

"He's not my boyfriend, Terry." He told his stepfather with an unusual distance in his tone. "But you were right in calling him a psycho, so unless you want him to finish the job, go join Mum in the pub or go to Frank's, so he can clean you up."

Terry was shouting at Steven, asking him who the hell he thought he was. Brendan approached him, and the man jumped a little and mumbled something about killing him. Brendan could've rolled his eyes, if he had any energy left. Men like Terry picked on people weaker than them, he wouldn't come near Brendan. Eventually he picked up a cloth to dab at the blood on his face, before leaving the house.

Brendan spoke for the first time since he broke the front door down, "he's not really going to the pub, is he? His eyeballs are practically falling out of their sockets."

Steven scoffed a little and turned his back to Brendan and headed out of the room, "proud of yourself, are you?" He was walking up the stairs and Brendan chased behind him.

"Why am I sensing attitude from you, Steven? I just saved you arse." He followed the boy into the bathroom.

Steven was inspecting his nose in the mirror. It was bleeding heavily and he had a cut above his eye that was leaving a stream of blood down his face. The sight of it made Brendan feel slightly nauseated. Red didn't suit him, not when it was in liquid form and dripping down his face.

"You didn't save anything, Brendan. He's gone to his mate, Frank's now. And later he'll be back with him." He looked at Brendan in the reflection of the mirror... "And he'll be pissed." He turned on the cold water tap, bent down to wash his face, and after he was done, he turned around to watch Brendan lean against the bathroom doorframe. "You could've killed him, Brendan."

It wasn't Brendan's intention to get Steven into even more trouble, and he wanted to stuff the boy into his car and drive him away from all this. Protect him. Take him away from it all. "That was the plan." It wasn't. He didn't want to be a murderer, but at that moment, he did feel like he could kill.

Steven looked at Brendan with a frown. The cut above his head was still bleeding. "I don't get you." He shook his head slowly. "At all" He turned back around and observed the cut on his head. Terry had been wearing a ring and the thing had torn his flesh. Brendan could tell by the way the boy winced when he touched it, that the cut must've hurt like a bitch. Steven spoke again as he pressed a finger to his injured skin to stop the bleeding, "I thought you didn't wanna see me again."

Brendan walked over to the toilet and put the lid down. Then he told Steven to sit. When he didn't, Brendan pulled him by his t-shirt and forced him to sit down. They didn't have a first aid kit by the looks of it, which was no surprise, so Brendan wet a wad of toilet paper, got down on his knees in front of Steven, and started dabbing it on his cut. He didn't even think about the fact that he was on the floor of a house that had disgusted him the first time he was here.

"I just came by to see if you made it out of the woods alive."

_And tell you who I am, and how sorry I am that I tried to manipulate you. And I'm sorry that I kissed you in the woods, and then left you when you asked me not to walk away. I'm sorry out of all the people you could've been confused over; you're confused over a screw up like me. I don't deserve the energy you waste in trying to figure out what is going on in my head; I don't even know what's going on in there. You'll probably never want to see me again. And I know I told you that's what I want, and that's what should happen, but I don't want that. I'm selfish, and I want you to understand. Please understand. _

_"_Well, I am. Thank you. Now you can leave." Steven pushed Brendan's hand away from his face and tried to stand up, but Brendan pulled him back down, and applied the wet paper to his head again. He avoided looking at the boy's neck where a bruise had formed. A bruise that was a result of his mouth sucking and biting against the skin there. The memory that the mark ignited, made Brendan feel a flush crawling up his neck.

Ste spoke again, drawing Brendan's attention back, "what do you want Brendan? You've seen that I'm alive, you can leave now. This isn't us not seeing each other again."

Brendan ignored his question and the reminder of what he had said to the boy the day before. He didn't have the courage to tell him what he really wanted to say. Not while Steven looked like he wouldn't spit on Brendan, if his gums were on fire. "You sound like you have a cold. Is that why you're not at work?"

"Get off me, Brendan." Steven shoved Brendan, and he fell back a little, stopping his fall by putting his hands on the ground. The boy got up off the toilet, walked over him and headed out of the bathroom. Brendan followed him out and into what was probably his bedroom.

The room had an inflatable mattress on the floor that Steven tripped over a little, and then he kicked it to get it out of the way. He went and sat on his bed, and Brendan looked around, saw a picture frame of a younger, more blonde Steven with his brother. Looking at Joseph in that photo, anyone would probably believe those that claimed he wouldn't hurt a fly. How could he when Steven looked so happy to be around him?

He turned back to Steven to find him texting on the phone. Brendan hadn't noticed the blood stains on Steven's t-shirt before. He looked away; it made him feel like demanding this Frank's address from Steven and finishing what he started with Terry. Instead he asked the boy if this was his room, and Steven told him to get out of his house. Brendan ignored him and sat down next to him on the bed. This was bad. He was meant to be telling Steven who he was, not getting on his bed.

"Why don't you leave this place, Steven?" He knew that leaving was easier said than done. Brendan was nearly twenty two, and he was still under the same roof as his father.

"Why? Because it's such a dump?" Steven asked, still not looking up from his phone.

"No. Because you have a bastard for a stepdad. He's the one that gave you the bruise you had on your face the day we met." It wasn't a question, he knew it even back then that the reason for the boy's marks probably had nothing to do with the fact that he had a reputation for being a trouble maker. That the reason was closer to home. Having that reputation was just a brilliant cover up. One that Brendan used to use.

Steven didn't reply for a while. He was still absorbed by his phone, so Brendan tried to look over and see what he was doing on it, mainly because it was stealing Steven's attention.

"I'll be out of here soon enough." He still wouldn't look up. Look up for Christ's sake.

"How so?"

Finally he drew his attention away from his phone. "What's it matter to you? You don't want anything to do with me, remember?"

Brendan took a deep breathe through his nose, "Steven, I shouldn't have kissed you, I'm sorry about that." Brendan found a moulding corner in the opposite side of the wall, and he kept his eyes on it. He didn't want to see the disappointment Steven would have on his face.

"Brendan, it's not the kiss you should be apologising for." Steven turned on his bed and sat up, legs crossed, facing Brendan who continued to stare ahead. "It's the freak out after."

"Steven, I just –"

"Just what? Just don't want people thinking you're gay?" Brendan could feel Steven frowning at him, challenging him to a confrontation.

"Why do you have to do this?" Brendan got up off the bed and kicked that stupid inflatable mattress out of the way. It knocked into the bedside cabinet and made the lamp on it fall. The mattress stopped it from smashing. "You make everything sound like it's black and white."

Steven was up off the bed now too, "I don't, Brendan. I don't know what's going on to make everything black and white. All I know is that you had me up against a tree one second, sucking face, and then you were talking about how you never want to see me again." Then he took a step back from Brendan, put his arms out when he said, "Yet here you are, in my house, in my bedroom."

"I just wanted to make sure you were okay, Steven." Brendan should've known things wouldn't go to plan as soon as he broke their front door down.

"No!" Steven shouted in insistence. "You didn't come here to make sure I was okay. You came here, because you can't stay away. And do you know what; we'll probably kiss again too."

No. They wouldn't. First time it was Steven. Second time Brendan wasn't thinking straight. He wouldn't have an excuse for a third time.

Steven was nodding at him, "yeah, it'll happen again, and you know why?" He came up into Brendan's face, and Brendan didn't have the power to push him away. And he wanted to know, he wanted to know what brought him back to Steven. Even before the kiss in the car. What was it that made him feel like he needed to be near him? "It'll happen because you want it to. You liked it. You may not like me, but you like the way I make you feel."

Brendan had Steven by the collar and up against a wall before he knew what was happening. He didn't kiss him. He wasn't going to give Steven the satisfaction of knowing he was right.

"You're wrong, Steven." He was wrong about the part when he said Brendan didn't like him. He did like Steven. More than he should. And he didn't know where the boy got any other idea from. "You don't know what you're talking about."

Steven smiled at him and shook his head. His eyes weren't the deep ocean blue Brendan had become accustomed to. They had a coldness in them, a coldness Brendan had put in there. "You know what would be funny? If someone saw us, right now. You, with your bloodied fists. Me, with my bloodied face. Backed against a wall, your face like thunder." Steven didn't look right. He looked like he'd had enough. "Anyone would think that you did this to me. That you were the one that bust my face."

Brendan backed away from him; he couldn't believe what he was hearing. He'd never hit him. For fuck's sake, he just nearly killed a man for doing so. He wanted to hide the boy away, he was so breakable. The last thing he would do is lay a finger on him.

"I didn't touch you, Steven." Brendan reminded the boy with a quake in his voice.

Steven fixed his t-shirt, from where Brendan had crumpled it when he held on to him. "I know that, you know that." He walked closer to Brendan. "But it's your word against mine."

"Steven." Brendan breathed. What was happening? This wasn't the Steven he knew. This was something else. Something he did. He should've stayed away from the boy, right from the beginning. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying; see how easy it is for me to say you did something when you didn't? See how easy it is to find yourself in a compromising situation?" Then whatever it was that was making Steven cold, broke. And he was crying, screaming, "see how easy it is to say someone raped you, when they didn't?!"

And there it was. Steven knew.

It was always going to happen. Anne warned him it was going to happen. He should've gotten here faster.

Brendan couldn't look at him. He looked past him. "How long have you known?" His voice didn't sound like his own, it was so foreign, so fragmented with emotions he didn't understand. Did he find out today? Did he find out the day before? Did he always know?

"You mean how long have I known that you were using me, manipulating me, –"

"No, no that's not how it was." He looked at Steven. This was it. This was his time to make Steven understand.

"– Pretending to be my friend and care about me?"

"No." He walked up to Steven, held on to his arms. "I have never pretended that, okay. I _do_ care about you."

Steven shoved him, and even though it was with one hand, Brendan staggered back. "Bullocks. Did you think I wouldn't find out? Really?" Steven's face was contorted with anger and disbelief and maybe, if Brendan wasn't imagining things, hurt. "Even when I have to stand up in court and call your sister a liar, did you think I wouldn't notice you sitting in court?"

Brendan shook his head, ran his fingers through his hair. "How long have you known?" He asked again.

"Since that day I came to your pub the first time. Doug told me Brendan Brady worked there, and I should stay away. What were the chances that the Brendan I knew would be _the_ Brendan Brady?" He scoffed a little and went to sit back down on his bed as he mumbled, "Looks like the chances were great."

Fucking Douglas. The urge to throttle the little American grew by the second.

Steven had known for over a week. He'd known since before the night in Warren's car. Brendan was so confused. Why would the boy kiss him, knowing who he was?

"I'm sorry, Steven." That's all he knew to say. He didn't have anything else. If Steven believed anything that came out of his mouth, he had to believe that. "I really am."

"What exactly did you think you'd achieve from this?"

He had a plan, he did. But that plan was so distant in his memory he forgot what it was. "I don't know. I guess I thought you could tell me something that'd help my sister."

"You mean get me brother in trouble." Steven looked at him like he couldn't believe that Brendan was still standing there. That he hadn't legged it as soon as Steven let him know that he knew who Brendan was. Then his jaws clenched slightly when he asked, "have you considered that maybe she is _lying, _just like I could lie about you beating me up."

Brendan didn't even have to think twice when he said a firm, "no." He clicked his neck before carrying on, "she wouldn't about something like that."

Steven was back on his feet, his eyebrows scrunched up into an angry frown. "Why would someone let their rapist walk them home and wait until the morning to report them?"

Brendan shook his head; he didn't want to hear this. He was the one that took her to the police station the next day, after he found her crying in her bed. He had to beg her to tell him what had happened, and he remembered how his insides had frozen when she had. Steven wasn't there; he didn't see how distraught she was. He didn't feel the rush of murder run through his body, he wasn't the one that was so overtaken by rage that he felt like if he couldn't take Joseph's life, then he'd split the world in two. He'd drag hell onto earth, so everyone could burn. Cheryl wouldn't lie to Brendan, not with knowing what he could do.

"Hmm? Why would she get onto the back of his bike with him after three in the fucking morning, if she was so scared of him?"

He didn't know. He didn't know the answer to any of these questions. He just knew that his sister was not lying. He wanted Steven to stop. These were all questions he didn't want to think about.

"He could've killed her, left her in a ditch. I mean, if he did rape her, he could've made sure she never lived to tell the tale. She went off with him easily enough." Steven was close to Brendan now. Too close. It was making Brendan twitchy.

He shouldn't have come here. He shouldn't have got mixed up with Steven. Steven was making Brendan do the one thing he swore he'd never do. He was making Brendan question Cheryl's truth.

Steven demanded an answer, "Tell me, why would she do that?"

"I DON'T KNOW!" The words were out of his mouth before he could stop them. "I don't know, Steven. I don't." Steven's own tears had dried on his cheeks, his sadness over Brendan's betrayal abandoned to adopt rage instead. It was Brendan who had a sting behind his eyes now. "All I know is that Chez wouldn't lie about this."

"And you know that how?" Steven asked, cocking his head to a side.

"She's my baby sister."

Steven nodded, and gave him a smile. It was filled with a twinge of misery. "And Joey is my brother. I'll always believe him, just like you'll always believe her." His smile faltered a little, but he held it. His eyes clouded over with what Brendan could only describe as anguish. "And I'm sorry that makes you hate me."

"I don't hate you, Steven." He was telling the truth. He didn't hate him; he hated the very fact that he couldn't. This could've been so much easier if he did. He could've done what needed to be done. And he would've been able to leave this flat with a fuck you and a hope you and your brother rot in hell.

"Of course you do." Steven insisted. "If you believe everything your sister is telling you, you believe that I was in the next room… letting it happen." His face became stone-like; he didn't let any emotion seep through when he told Brendan, "You have to hate me. Or you have to believe that your sister is a liar." He looked Brendan dead in the eye, and even if Brendan wanted to look away, he couldn't. Steven looked at him with such intensity that he felt like the boy's eyes were sucking him in. His pupils a vacuum, leaving Brendan with no air to breath and the knowledge that if he didn't get out soon, he'd erupt. "We both know you'll always believe her."

Steven was right. There was no way in hell that he could have both Cheryl and Steven in his life. But he had to make him understand that he never did anything to the boy out of hatred for him. "Steven, I –"

"I mean, why else would you send those thugs to beat me up." Steven had fresh unshed tears in his eyes. He had a concentration on his face, making sure that they wouldn't fall.

"Steven, I had nothing to do with that." Brendan's eyes were wide and he walked up to Steven, put a hand on the boy's chest, his mouth close to the boy's forehead. "You have to believe me."

Steven lost his concentration and a single tear trickled down his cheek. He wasn't even looking at Brendan, he was looking through him. Like he couldn't even stand the sight of him. "How can I believe anything that you say, you've had one goal since the day you met me. And that was to hurt my brother. I was your perfect in."

"Steven, I swear to you –"

"Were you behind the newspaper clippings too?" He asked with eyebrows drawn.

"NO!" Brendan screamed, because he wasn't getting through to Steven. He removed his hand from the boy's chest and put it on his cheek to get him to look up at him properly. Steven wasn't understanding. He was supposed to understand. He had to remind Steven that he never asked about Joseph. He never brought up that night. He never used him. "Steven, listen to me–"

Someone was coming up the stairs, and it wasn't Brendan that jumped back. Steven shoved him as hard as he could. Panic rose up into his face. At first Brendan couldn't get his head round it. Terry wouldn't hit him again while Brendan was here. But it wasn't Terry he was panicking about.

A blonde headed figure was at the door, with a face like thunder. It looked at Steven, took in the blood on his t-shirt. The drying blood on his nose, above his eye and, the swelling around it. Then it took in Brendan, him and his red, bloodied fist. With the door off its hinges downstairs, this did not look good.

"What the hell have you done?" Joseph asked as he approached Brendan.


	14. Chapter 14

A/N: You guys are the reason that I even continue to write this story. All your reviews, which I cannot thank you enough for, make this fic a joy to write. Hence why, I seem to be updating way more often than I had imagined I would. You guys motivate me and I love you for it.

The chapter is shorter than my usual because it was supposed to have Bren's POV too. But it got ridiculously long and I didn't have time to edit the whole thing because I have been abroad for work, so I had to split it and you'll have that next week.

I feel like I should warn you that this chapter is sort of violent at the beginning, and I apologise if that's not your thing. But really, what did you expect? Really hope this chp isn't disappointing.

Enjoy :)

**Chapter 14**

"Oh, this should be interesting." Brendan gave a mirthless laugh and shook his head slightly, like he couldn't believe he found himself in such a situation.

Ste stared, wide eyed as his brother approached Brendan, fists so tight that his knuckles looked like they were about to pop through his skin. Ste had never seen his brother fight before, but this was probably going to become his first time.

"Did you attack my brother?" Joey asked. He was asking about Ste's current state, not the attack Ste had asked Brendan about earlier. Joey had already made up his mind about that.

Ste tried to speak up; he tried to tell Joey that Brendan had nothing to do with his bloodied face, but as he opened his mouth, Brendan turned to look at him and Joey punched him right across the face. He told Brendan not to look at his brother, that he had some nerve doing so after beating him up. Brendan's head hit the wall behind him, and he allowed himself to slide down it. Joey lifted him up by the lapels of his jacket and punched Brendan again, but he didn't let him fall this time, he held onto him as he threw punch after punch.

"This one is for his first rib." Punch.

"This one is for his second." Punch.

"Third." Punch.

"Fourth." Punch.

Joey brought his knee up and slammed it between Brendan's legs, "that's for his concussion." And when Brendan doubled over from the pain, Joey grabbed a fistful of Brendan's hair, and smashed his head against the wall, once, twice, three times. "And that's for his broken arm."

Ste screamed at his brother to stop, he'd never seen him like this before. So crazy, so manic, so Terry-like. It was as if he was taking out years of frustration on Brendan, frustration that had accumulated due to all the times he couldn't stop Terry, couldn't hurt him for what he did to Ste. But Joey was going to finish Brendan for the hurt _he_ had caused. For the hurt Joey presumed he had caused. Ste would've tried to physically stop him, but he was scared to get close to the disaster that was unfolding before him. Why wasn't Brendan defending himself? He knew first hand – from his display downstairs – that the guy could hold his own. Why wasn't he fighting back? Ste didn't want his brother hurt, but Brendan was just letting himself get beat up.

That changed though.

Brendan grabbed Joey's arm when he next raised it, and stopped the next punch from hitting his face. He pushed Joey away from him as hard as he could, before standing up straight. His nose was bleeding, he was going to have some serious bruising on his face, and if the way he groaned a little when he stood up straight was anything to go by, Joey had probably either bruised his abdomen area, or cracked a rib or two of his own. Brendan moved his jaw around a bit, making sure it was still working, before he punched an oncoming Joey right in the stomach.

"Now that you've had your fun," he spoke menacingly, directly into Joey's ear, "it's my turn." Then he brought his knees up and rammed it hard against Joey's head.

Ste's screamed. He felt pathetic. There was nothing he could do to stop what was about to become a bloodbath, fast. He ran to where the two older boys threw blows at each other, but backed away when Joey nearly fell on him, and blood from his mouth sprayed across Ste's face. Ste gasped a little from the contact and walked back till he tripped and fell onto the inflatable mattress. He wiped the blood from his face and brought his shaky hand down to look at it. The vivid crimson made his head spin and terror clog his throat.

Now it was Brendan's turn to call Joey up on all the things he thought the older Hay was guilty of. He threw punch after punch, kick after kick, repeating, "This is for Cheryl. This and this and this and this."

It was the same as Joey assuming Brendan was guilty of both his state today, and his earlier attack. Brendan swore to Ste he wasn't behind the alleyway attack, and they both knew who had attacked him this time. The whole situation was giving Ste a headache. Brendan thought Joey attacked his sibling, and Joey thought Brendan attacked his. Both of them were wrong. Joey didn't do anything, Brendan - as far as Ste knew - wasn't behind any of his attacks. Why couldn't people just tell the truth? The matter of fact was, Brendan could be lying about the alleyway. Just like Brendan believed Joey could be lying about Cheryl.

And if Ste was completely honest with himself he had to face that Joey _could_ just as equally be lying about Cheryl, like Brendan could be lying about him.

But he knew his brother, he wouldn't do that. He didn't know Brendan, not really. And what he did know, was that Brendan had deceived him from the moment they met. He was the more culpable of the two. The one with the history of deceit.

"Guys, stop it!" He shouted at them, making his throat hurt. That fear of how far these two would actually go to avenge the people they loved, still lodged in his oesophagus. He didn't dare go near them again; they both appeared to have something animalistic about them, primal: fighting to the death to protect the people in their care.

But what happened when that line became blurred, or worse? What happened when it became tangled? Ste didn't want Joey to have some kind of combat with Brendan for him. Brendan cared about his sister, Joey cared about his brother, they knew what they were fighting for. But Ste cared about them both. He had taken the line that was supposed to separate them, and twisted and turned it till two worlds that were never meant to come together, were crashing into one another. Two worlds that were currently tearing chunks out of one another.

The fight moved, and soon the older boys were outside the room and at the top of the staircase. Ste knew, even before it happened, that one of them would go tumbling down. It was Joey. Brendan threw a punch, and he lost his footing and fell. Brendan ran down after him, Ste following close behind. He was about to have a mass panic attack when his brother barely moved, but as Brendan's foot hit the last stair, he groaned and sat up. Brendan bent down to try and throw another punch, but Joey grabbed the phone from the hallway table and smacked it hard into the side of Brendan's face, making him fall to the ground too.

Brendan attempted to put a hand to the assaulted cheek, but Joey did it again and again. On and on. And Ste saw something in his eyes he'd never seen before. A thirst for blood, a look that said no amount of Ste screaming _no _would get him to discontinue. Ste tried it anyway, begged him to stop. But he carried on. He was killing him, he was killing Brendan. This wasn't Joey, this wasn't his brother.

Then suddenly Joey was on the floor, clutching on to his head. Brendan was still on the ground too, and the bloodied phone was between them. Both boys groaned, and Ste felt himself breathe a sigh of relief as Brendan squirmed, he was alive. Joey hadn't killed him. But Ste had a frame in his hand; it was the one that fell to the floor earlier when Brendan had been throttling Terry. He'd retrieved it and hit Joey over the head with it to get him to stop.

Shit, this day was one heck of a violence fest. Terry, Brendan, Joey, himself, they all had a fist coming at them at one point or another.

Ste dropped the frame to the ground, and Joey moaned, "Ste, what the fuck, man?"

"S-sorry." He stuttered. He didn't mean to hit his brother so hard, but he needed to knock out whatever it was that possessed him. "You were about to kill him." He wanted to bend down and check if Brendan was okay, he was making sounds of pain, but he wasn't moving much. He wanted to bend down and whisper in his ear, tell him he was sorry that his brother came home to find him. He had tried to keep him away.

But Joey was looking at him, and he'd wonder what the fuck Ste was playing at if he showed concern towards Brendan's health. So he stepped over him and went to check on his brother. He put a hand to Joey's nose, and the older Hay winced.

"Sorry." Ste mumbled, then moved aside Joey's blood soaked hair away from his forehead, so he could take a better look at his face. He ignored the voice inside him, screaming to turn to Brendan. "Joey, what the hell were you thinking? It's not bad enough that you're charged with attacking one Brady, you want another charge for attacking the other too?"

Joey clicked his neck to a side and swatted Ste's hand away. But then he looked over Ste's head, above him, and his eyes widened as he pushed Ste hard in the chest. His back hit the opposite wall, making his lungs smash hard against his ribs, forcing him cough out from the impact.

But he wasn't thinking about his pain, he was too distracted by Brendan standing over his brother and bringing the bloodied phone down at a lethal angle towards Joey's skull. He was aiming to kill, not maim. A sound escaped Ste's mouth; he didn't hear it himself, as much as he had felt it. Felt the words force themselves out of his throat as if they were solid entities and attached to a string. And someone pulled at that string hard, forced those solid words out him, covered in his blood and anguish whether he wanted them to escape or not.

He didn't know if it was for Joey or Brendan, when he screamed, "BRENDAN, PLEASE!"

It could've been for Joey, with the angle Brendan was holding the phone and the damage Joey's head had already gone through during the fight, one, hard enough blow to the skull could've killed him. Or it could've been for Brendan, if he killed Joey, there was no excuse in any corners of the world that he could conjure up, that'd make whatever he felt towards Brendan acceptable.

Both the older boys turned to look at him. It was the first time Ste had said Brendan's name since his brother had turned up. Brendan stopped and froze when he heard it, Ste couldn't help comparing it to how Joey hadn't, when Ste called _his_ name. Brendan looked as if he just realised that Ste had witnessed the entire fight. And Joey, Ste could tell Joey was wondering what the hell was going on. It was too familiar the way Ste had called for Brendan to stop, and it was too suspicious the way Brendan had listened.

Brendan let the phone drop. It used to be white, but it was covered by red now. He picked Joey up by his collar, and gave him one last punch to the stomach, and then he threw him to the side like some rag doll, before heading out the door.

When Brendan was gone, Ste crawled to his brother and asked him if he was okay, and Joey told Ste not to worry about him, asked if he had hurt him when he pushed him really hard. Ste laughed a little. Joey was back, his brother Joey. The one that was covered in blood, but still concerned as to whether Ste was hurt. He gave his older brother a light punch on the shoulder and called him an idiot. Told him he should look in the mirror, and then ask about Ste's wellbeing. It made Joey smile.

But then Ste stood up. He told his brother that he was going to go see what Brendan's problem was, make sure he wasn't going to go to the police. Joey said to let the prick go, that he wouldn't go to the cops, it was Brendan who came here and he had done what he came for. He got to beat the fuck out of Joey. Ste walked out the door anyway, said he didn't want to risk it. He heard Joey call after him, telling him that the psycho would beat him up too, but he ignored him.

Brendan was in his car when Ste got to him. He had his head resting on the steering wheel and he was breathing heavily, like he was breathing through the pain. He knocked on Brendan's window, and when Brendan didn't move, he continued knocking on it until Brendan opened it, head still on the wheel.

"What do you want, Steven?" He asked without looking up.

Ste didn't know what to say. He didn't really know why he was out here with Brendan, while his brother was inside half dead because of him. He didn't know, so he said the most stupid thing he could think of, "I-I got your umbrella upstairs, if you want it back."

If Brendan's eyes were open, they'd probably be rolling at him. "Keep it."

Ste looked back at his door to make sure no one was watching or listening, when he asked, "are you okay?" Ste's voice was lowered, like he was scared Joey might hear, even through the distance.

Finally Brendan looked up, and Ste noticed the blood patch his head had left on the steering wheel. Brendan's expression was one of disbelief, like he couldn't believe that Ste was even asking that question.

"I'm dandy. Thank you for asking, Steven. Now off you pop to your brother." He smiled a vicious smile. "Think it's time for him to feed you your nighty night milk."

Ste shook his head slightly, "Fuck you, Brendan."

"No, fuck you." Brendan hissed, as he climbed out of his car and slammed the door shut. He pointed a finger to Ste's chest. "I save your arse from your stepfather, and then have my face smashed by your brother. That's a great thank you, that."

"I didn't tell you to come here." That was a lame response, but it was true. "This is where Joey lives; of course there was a chance of him turning up."

"A chance that was heightened by you constantly texting him." Brendan cocked his head to a side. "Yeah, I saw the name when I leaned over to see earlier. What were you saying, 'hurry up, he's finally here.' Like a rat in a cage."

What was he going on about? He _was_ texting Joey. But he was trying to keep him away, he was telling him to get stuff for him, stuff that Joey would never find at the store he was at. It'd mean he'd have to walk further away. He didn't have his bike with him, so it would've taken him a while. He was trying to do the opposite of what Brendan was accusing him of.

Ste tried to open his mouth to defend himself, but Brendan spoke first, "Is that why you admitted to knowing about the truth? Because this would be the final time you'd have to deal with me?"

"No." Ste couldn't understand how this was turning around to be his fault. "I was trying to keep him away."

"Course you were."

"Brendan, you gave as good as you got in there, right. You were the one that came into my home, not just this time, but before, with the intention to beat my brother up. You wanted your in, you_ finally _got into my house, and got your hands on my brother. That's what you've wanted all along. All that time with me finally paid off."

Brendan nodded slowly, like the movement made his brain collide painfully against his skull. He started laughing in a manic way; he tilted his head back and guffawed into the sky. Ste had to look back at his door to make sure it didn't get anyone's attention, namely Joey. When he turned back around, Brendan was still chuckling to himself, and wiping his nose of the blood there. "Yeah, I did," he said, observing the blood on his hands. "He attacked my sister and I –"

"No, you _think_ that, just like he thinks you attacked his brother." Ste interrupted. "Only Cheryl and Joey know what the real truth is. And only you know if you were behind my attack. And me?" Ste shrugged his shoulders like he had no idea what was going on. "I'm just stuck in the middle, not knowing anything right."

Brendan bent down a little, so he was at a level height with Ste, "don't play that game with me. You've known who I am for over a week. Before what had happened in Warren's car, before the woods. And you have been playing me ever since."

Ste started shaking his head fast. That wasn't what had happened. He hadn't planned what had happened in the car. It would've been so much easier if he was just messing with Brendan, that way he wouldn't feel like he was betraying Joey by being out here with him now. He would've been able to turn away from Brendan, tell him to piss off.

Brendan didn't give him a chance to talk, he carried on speaking over whatever protest Ste tried to make, "you got into my head and you started playing games. You kissed me that night in the car with the sole purpose of fucking with me." Why was he saying all this? Did he really believe it? "You may think I manipulated you, to get my hands on your brother and that I succeeded in doing so." He pulled his face down close to Ste's and bared his teeth, "but don't you dare play the innocent party. You have been manipulating since the moment you found out, everything from then on has been one effing lie on your part as much as mine." He backed away then, pulled open his car door, but didn't get in. "Well done, Steven. You successfully fucked me over." Then he climbed into his car and looked ahead as he put on his seat belt, he wouldn't even look at Ste.

Ste tried to protest, but the older boy turned on his ignition, and when finally turned to look at him, it was with an empty smile, "we're even. I manipulated you, you did it right back." He looked ahead again, "congratulation, Steven."

And then he drove away.

When Ste turned around, Joey was standing on the front steps, watching him with a packet of frozen peas on one eye. Ste gave him a smile, but his brother didn't return it, he raised an eyebrow instead and walked back into the house. Ste rubbed his face, and when his fingers touched the cut above his eye, he rolled his eyes at the events of the day.

He trudged back into his house, closed the door as well as he could, considering how Brendan had broken it, walked past the carnage in the hallway and up the stairs. Joey was in the bathroom washing his hands and face of the blood that was probably a mixture of his _and_ Brendan's.

"What was he doing here, Ste?" Joey asked while he scrubbed at his raw knuckles. Ste didn't say anything at first, but then Joey asked, "Did he do that to your face?"

Ste could've lied now; he told Brendan how he could've easily laid the blame on him. But he didn't want the dark haired boy in trouble. It was an empty threat made in anger. Anger to do with his lies, Cheryl's lies. Lies lies lies.

Ste shook his head slightly and looked to the ground, "he didn't touch me, Joey. This was all Terry."

Joey turned around and flapped his hands around a little, getting rid of the excess water. He looked at Ste with an expression of confusion, "What was he doing here, then? And Where's Terry?"

Ste swallowed and sat down on the toilet with its lid down, just like Brendan had left it. The wad of wet tissues Brendan had been using on his cut was on the floor too, he hoped Joey hadn't noticed. He placed his foot over it.

"Terry was having a go, punched me across the face a few times. Brendan barged in; you've seen the door, and got Terry off me. Terry went to Frank's; they're probably planning to set me alight while I sleep as we speak." Ste played with the hem of his t-shirt as he spoke.

He shouldn't have wound Terry up, if he didn't do that, this mess wouldn't have occurred. Terry wouldn't have hit him, Brendan wouldn't have barged in and beaten Terry up, and then Joey wouldn't have gotten the wrong conclusion and fought Brendan. They were both fighting for the sake of their siblings.

He didn't even know why he was being a dick to Terry, who he knew wouldn't take his attitude well. Maybe he wanted Terry to react, to show some passion in his feelings towards Ste, even if that feeling was hatred. Ever since Brendan had left him in the woods, he had been in a mood with everyone. He didn't go to work in fear of bumping into Brendan. He had the cold too, but that was just the excuse he gave Tony, and Joey when he asked. Told them he couldn't have a snotty nose around food, sneezing every two seconds. Truthfully, he just didn't want to see Brendan, and not because he was necessarily mad with him, though he knew that should've been what he was feeling, but he didn't want to witness the older boy purposefully act like he didn't exist. If Ste didn't see him, he could just pretend it was because their paths weren't crossing. Not because Brendan had said goodbye.

But then Brendan had turned up, like superman, but instead of being bright and full of hope, he was in black, and dread had filled Ste when the older boy laid into Terry like he wanted to kill him. Ste screamed at him to stop, but he was lost in a haze of violence, and then when he stopped hitting Terry, he was strangling him. Watching as blood shot into Terry's eyes and his face turned blue. Even Terry's nails scraping at Brendan's flesh didn't make him loosen his grip, and Ste was scared. Scared he was going to make a murderer out of Brendan. When tears escaped his eyes, they weren't for Terry's sake; they were for the older boy who wouldn't ever be able to let it go if he took a life.

Finally, Ste pulled at him, and when Brendan looked back, it was as if he just realised what he was doing for the first time. Like Ste had just brought him back from some dark pit he found himself in. He let go, and Ste just stared at him. Brendan just nearly killed a man, because said man was laying into Ste. Ste whose brother was being charged with his sister's rape. Yet here he was, defending Ste. He didn't get, why couldn't Brendan just hate him and be done with it? Why did he have to do stuff like that and make Ste's head want to explode?

Brendan had stared right back, like the same thing was going on in his head, like he couldn't believe the fucked up situation they were both in. But then Terry called Brendan his boyfriend, and Brendan looked like the word had physically slapped him around the face. And it stung. Ste looked away and told Terry that he needed to get out before Brendan went psycho again. Terry wasn't too impressed by that, and Ste knew he'd pay later for Brendan's intervention, but he had needed Terry out of the way to get his head straight.

Brendan spoke about the injuries he had inflicted on Terry so casually, like it was no big deal. Ste couldn't help but wonder if Brendan thrived from violence just like Terry did. He looked so lost in it when he was throwing punches at Ste's stepdad.

Ste had become short with Brendan, why was he here? He had told Ste to stay away, yet the next day he was in Ste's house beating on Terry for hitting him. This didn't appear to be anything like what Brendan said he had wanted the previous day. Ste had sounded ungrateful to Brendan when he asked him what he wanted, he knew that. But when Brendan had flinched at the word boyfriend, it had upset him slightly. Brendan wasn't his boyfriend, but it hurt that the older boy was so repulsed by the idea of it. Was he that disgusted by Ste?

But then he was touching Ste, he was trying to clean him up and that only made him angrier. Brendan was the epitome of mixed messages. Ste couldn't understand how the hands that were caressing him the day before, the hands that were gently applying wet tissues to his cut, were capable of such brutality. He wanted Brendan to make sense, why did he never make sense?

He had seen the dark haired boy's eyes quickly glance at the bruise he had left there the previous day. Joey hadn't asked about it, just gave him a knowing smile and raised his eyebrows, before hitting the back of his head with a towel. It was his older brother's way of of saying, _you dirty little shit._

Eventually, Ste had pushed Brendan away from him, the close proximity and the scent of the older boy would've had him leaning closer in if he didn't get him to back away. He had gone to his room, knowing Brendan was following behind, and checked his phone which was flashing with the signal that he had a new text. It was from Joey, asking if he wanted anything from the off license. And panic had overtaken Ste; the off license wasn't too far from where they lived, so he'd be back soon. Ste had to keep him out of the house whilst Brendan, who was looking around his room, was here. He had told his brother to get lots of shit he'd never find at the off license to keep him searching for longer, and hopefully make him venture out.

Brendan was asking him questions about why he didn't leave, like he cared about the fact that Ste lived in a house with a man who used him as a punch bag. And when Ste asked had what it was to Brendan, because of course he didn't actually care despite what had happened downstairs, the older boy apologised for kissing. Ste wanted to whack him then and there. He didn't want to hear an apology for that. Brendan had plenty he could say sorry about, but he had picked the only thing Ste didn't want him to be sorry for.

It was all a game. He was here in the first place for Joey, and when he had told him that he had come to check on Ste, that was another lie. Brendan's goal was the older Hay, so when he turned up on their doorstep, it had been for him, just like the first time. And Ste had enough. He'd had enough of being a pawn in all this. He was saying stuff to Brendan that probably weren't even true, like how Brendan couldn't stay away, how Brendan liked kissing him, liked the way he made Brendan feel. And when Brendan had him backed against a wall, he exploded like he always knew he would.

Before he knew it, he was throwing empty threats at Brendan, because he needed him to be just as hurt in all this. He needed to know that it fucking killed being used. That he could use Brendan to get his own back on Cheryl for lying about her brother, just like Brendan had been using him to get his own back on Joey. He didn't have to outright tell the older boy he knew, he caught on. And Ste had to get himself to look past the fact that he looked devastated. He was a good liar, good liars made good actors. And Ste had to try his hardest not to believe him, when he had said that he did care about Ste.

Why had he said? Everything was out in the open, he didn't have to lie.

Ste had asked him about the attack, he asked him about the newspaper clippings, and before that he asked a whole load of questions about Cheryl that Brendan couldn't answer. Bringing those up seemed to pain him, but she was what all this had been about. Ste needed to know that Brendan didn't intend on breaking Ste with nothing other than just his sister's words to go on. But that was exactly all there was to it, and Ste couldn't even hate him over that. He was by Joey's side completely, just because Joey _told_ him he didn't do it.

He denied the beating and the clippings, and Ste honestly didn't know what to believe, and he hadn't had time to process it before Joey came home.

Then all hell was loose.

Ste was brought back to the present with a smashing sound, and he looked up to see the mirror had been punched into by an angry Joey.

"JOEY!"

"What the fuck was Terry's problem now? And what was that arsehole doing around our house, anyway?"

Ste got up off the toilet and went to observe his brother's hand; he started picking at the small shards of the mirror that were still lodged into his skin. "I told Terry to get his own fucking drinks. He didn't like me speaking back. And I don't know what Cheryl's brother was doing here."

"Did you know who he was before he turned up?" Joey winced a bit as Ste's finger slipped and he accidently dug a shard further in, instead of picking it out.

Ste looked up at his brother, and waited till the older Hay met his eyes before he answered, "I didn't know who he was." It was half true. When everything was revealed between them, Brendan dropped his act and he let his viscous side out on Joey. And Ste didn't recognise that person. He could finally reveal himself; he had gotten what he came for. What all this had started for. The person Ste knew was made up to trick him. "I didn't even know you knew who he was." That was the full truth. Ste didn't know if the older boys had ever crossed paths to actually recognise each other. Brendan had obviously done his research into Joey to know what he looked like, but Ste wasn't aware Joey would be familiar with Brendan.

"I recognised him because Cheryl, that nut job, was talking about her beloved brother and showing me pictures." Joey adopted an overly high pitched voice and a Belfast accent to mimic Cheryl, when he said. "This is my big brother, Brendan, he thinks he's all big and tough, but he's a real softy really." Joey snorted at the irony of her comment, with what had just happened between him and her brother. He was quiet for a while, but then he bit the inside of his bottom lip before he said, "It's just, there was something about him that made it seem like he knew you."

Ste swallowed, "like what?"

"Like the fact that when you called his name he stopped." Joey said without breaking eye contact. If Ste broke it, his older brother would guess that he had in fact been acquainted with Brendan before.

He held it.

"I guess…" He didn't know what to say. "It was probably more to do with the fact that, if he did end up killing you, he'd be facing worse charges than you."

"And the way you called his name?" Joey questioned, not missing a beat.

"Joey, what is this? I didn't have a clue as to who he were." Ste tried to hold his voice firm; he hoped the plea for Joey to believe him, wasn't obvious.

Joey sighed and pulled his hands from Ste's hold and ran it under the tap. "I'm sorry. I just, I feel like everyone is conspiring against me, and I can't lose you." He looked up to smile at his younger brother, his brother whose insides were burning with guilt. "Not to them. You're all that I have." He removed his hand from the sink and wrapped it up in a towel and sat on the edge of the tub and sighed. "I guess I'm just trying to figure out why he'd be rescuing my brother from my father's clutches, when he has a vendetta against me. And how he ended upstairs with you in our room."

Ste took a deep breath. He was never any good at creative writing, but he needed to come up with a story fast. "He must've come here looking for you. Seen Terry hitting me, and it was his perfect excuse to break our door down. Which by the way, you need to fix."

Joey rolled his eyes and groaned before climbing into the bath and laying in it. Like the tub could protect him from everything. Bit like when a child climbs under the duvet when there's thunder. Ste took the chance to pick up the tissues Brendan had used on his cut and lifted the lid of the toilet to throw it in, before flushing it away. It was like flushing away the last evidence of the pretence Brendan had with him.

He sat on the edge of the tub and watched his brother stare up at the ceiling, like it held answers to questions he had. Questions like, why was this happening to him?

"Anyway, I was up here trying to clean up, and he followed me up, and then followed me to the room." Ste clicked his knuckles for the next bit. Up until then, he wasn't really lying. "He wanted to know when you'd be back." Brendan never asked about Joey, not specifically about him, anyway. "The only reason he probably saved my neck was probably to get information about your whereabouts. I tried to keep you away, I did."

Joey laughed, and then coughed from his injuries. "Ah that was why you wanted the most random crap, from the most random places. I only came back to get more money."

They fell into silence for a while, both of them thinking about how the day had turned out. But there was something nagging at Ste.

"Joey?" Ste called, he needed to know something, and when his brother hummed a response to show that he was listening, he continued, "What got into? I was screaming at you to stop, it was like you couldn't hear or see me." His voice cracked a little, he didn't want Joey to think that this meant he doubted him. That this meant Ste thought, if he couldn't hear Ste protesting, then maybe he couldn't hear Cheryl when she did it. But raping someone, and attacking them for hurting your younger brother were two different things. Right? "It was like you were a different person." He finished.

Joey sat up, groaned as he moved positions, his back against the end of the bath, his legs out in front of him. "Remember in the hospital you told me to promise you that I wouldn't do anything stupid, you remember that?" He waited for Ste to nod before he continued, "And I couldn't do it. I knew that if I got my hands on Brendan Brady for hurting you, I would kill him."

"He said he wasn't behind it." Ste hoped his defensive tone wasn't obvious.

Joey looked at him pityingly, "little brother, he's hardly going to admit it." Ste ignored the voice inside of him whispering how it was exactly like how Joey would hardly admit to attacking Cheryl Brady. "You're right Ste; I wasn't myself when I had him in my hands. I wanted him to feel everything you felt, but it's not in me to take a life, so I had to become something else." He smiled and raised his eyebrows at Ste, "you know, up until you hit me over the head with mum's picture of a watering can."

Ste tried to smile along with him, but he found it hard. He was the bane of everyone's existence. Terry hated him. His mum hated him. Brendan hated him. And Joey, who did care about him, he had nearly turned into a killer.

"You know what; I can't even hate Brendan for wanting to kill me too." Joey said as he groaned again and climbed out the bath and walked out of the bathroom, speaking as he went. "He thinks I did something awful to his sister; it's natural for him to be after my blood." See, Joey wasn't bad, he was even sympathising with the guy that was just about to cave his head in less than an hour ago. He carried on speaking as he walked in to the bedroom, "It's the part where he went after you that made my blood boil."

Joey started tidying up some of the mess he had made whilst fighting with Brendan, but he was in too much pain, so Ste told him to lie down on the bed and he'd pick up the mess. Once Joey was down, he continue. "I didn't know that it wasn't him that hit you this time, so I saw red because I thought he hurt you all over again." Brendan _did _hurt him, just not the way Joey thought he did. They were silent for a moment as Ste carried on tidying the mess, and then Joey called for Ste's attention. "Hey." Ste turned around to the voice. "I'm sorry if I scared you."

Ste stood up, abandoning what he was doing, and sat cross legged on the inflatable mattress. It looked like they were finally swapping sleeping places then. "Joey, we should take you to a hospital." He wasn't going to deny that Joey had him scared. He was scared Joey would get into even worse trouble. He was scared that either Brendan or Joey wouldn't have come out of the fight alive. And he was even more scared about how the idea of losing Brendan hurt nearly as much as the idea of losing Joey did.

Joey laughed, holding onto his ribs, "and tell them what? All the good excuses for broken ribs and bust up faces have been used on you. If I go to the hospital, the police will find out and ask questions. I can't risk it."

Ste sighed where he was sitting and Joey asked him if Brendan said anything, anything to make him doubt Joey's innocence. Because he needed to know, he needed to know if he still had Ste in his corner. That the fight hadn't scared him away.

Ste forced a reassuring smile on his face and reached out to hold his brother's arm. He still believed Joey, he just didn't know if he had the grounds to anymore. Not because Joey frightened him away with how he behaved during the fight, but because just like he could be wrong about Brendan lying about not being behind his attack, he could be wrong about Cheryl lying about hers. But he believed Joey, he believed him because for so long it was just them two, Joey was all he had, and he was all Joey had. He believed him because he was his brother.

Ste gripped on to Joey's arm harder, he was gripping on to his beliefs, "you have me all the way."

_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx_

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Come by, say hello... also review :P_


	15. Chapter 15

A/N: You're probably getting bored of me thanking y'all, but I feel like there's not enough I can say to express my gratitude to all of you who read, review etc etc.

Enjoy :)

**Chapter 15**

"Where are you going?" Seamus asked Brendan, as he passed his father in the kitchen, cooking breakfast. That was new. Normally this early Seamus would still be in bed, he wouldn't have been frying eggs.

"Out." He didn't want to converse with the man for longer than necessary. But then Cheryl was walking down the stairs and asking him to stay for breakfast. "Not hungry." He replied to her offer, as he put his jacket on, groaning a little as his muscles and bruises ached from the fight with Joseph.

"You don't eat enough." His father commented, walking out of the kitchen and placing a plate down for him to eat. "You're a scrawny wretch, even now."

Brendan licked his lip and counted to ten in his head to stop himself from picking up the plate, and thrusting its content down his father's throat, till he choked on it. He guessed this was his celebratory breakfast. Seamus had practically gleamed with pride the night before, when Brendan told him how he got the cuts and bruises. Cheryl had been there too, but she didn't say anything. Brendan had half expected her to jump with joy and bring out the party poppers. Instead she had stood there silently and listened until he told his father and her that he was going to bed.

He had driven to Warren's flat straight after leaving Steven's place to clean up. He couldn't go home in the state he was, Cheryl would've freaked out if she saw him. Going to Anne's was out of the question too. Not only would she and Katy also freak out, but Anne would know that there was more to it than simply finally getting his hands on Joseph Hay. He needed someone who believed that he had only one agenda, when he became a part of Steven Hay's life. He needed someone who would believe that everything that happened in the Hay house was part of the plan.

Warren had opened the door - clearly not doing anything with his Friday night, other than watching the telly and drinking beer – with wide eyes as they fell on Brendan.

"What the fuck happened to you?" Warren had asked as Brendan barged his way past him and sat down on his sofa with a groan.

Brendan had told him that he needed a shower to get rid of all the blood, and to massage his quickly purpling skin. Warren had sipped at his beer; hand in pocket, as he looked over Brendan, remarking on what a mess he looked like. Then he led Brendan to his bathroom, passed him a towel and some clean clothes. Brendan couldn't help thinking how this was the second time in a row that he was left wearing other people's clothes thanks to a Hay brother. But he had no choice. His own clothes were decorated in splatters of blood all over, his and Joseph's.

When he had showered and was back out in the living room, Warren had left him a bottle of beer on his coffee table. He hadn't even waited for Brendan to sit down before he started asking questions.

"You get into a fight?" Warren asked, obviously missing clear evidence of the fact.

"What do you think, Foxy?"

"I think you got your arse kicked." He said with a grin, before settling down next to Brendan, making him groan in pain again as the seat sunk beside him.

"You should see the other guy." Brendan grumbled as he adjusted himself on the sofa, so it didn't hurt so much to just breathe.

"If the other guy looks worse than you, he has to be dead." Warren chuckled, like it was the funniest thing he'd ever said.

Joseph would've been dead if Brendan had it his way. He was finally going to fulfil his desire for Joseph's blood, up until the point in which he had heard Steven screaming. It wasn't just that his voice had penetrated Brendan's haze, but it was the desperation in it, like killing Joseph would be having to destroy him too. And right then, when Brendan had turned his head to look at a panic stricken Steven, he had seen himself through Steven's eyes. Choking Terry was one thing, Steven didn't love him, Steven would be better off without him, but Joseph, Joseph was different. Steven loved Joseph and killing him in front of Steven's eyes would ruin him in a way there was no coming back from.

Killing Joseph would be like killing Steven. When Brendan let the phone drop, he wasn't letting Joseph live, he was keeping Steven alive.

And that was when everything made sense to Brendan. To some extent.

Steven had used him in a way he would have never imagined the boy capable. He guessed that he didn't know Steven after all; he was stupid to think he did after only a few of weeks. Steven had made Brendan care for him; he had made Brendan want to protect him. Just like that, in a matter of weeks. So when it came down to getting face to face with Joseph, Brendan would walk away, _because_ of Steven. He made Brendan pick him over Cheryl. When he let the phone go, he was betraying his position as Cheryl's older brother, her older brother who was supposed to protect her, and avenge her. He was picking Steven, because he couldn't bear to hurt him in a way that would kill his very essence.

That's what it had all been about. The kiss in the car, despite knowing who he was, the fact that he hadn't said anything to Brendan for so long. And when he did, it was too late for Brendan. He had already trapped him in a house with Joseph, knowing that Brendan wouldn't kill him like he'd always wanted. He would have to come face to face with the older Hay, and let him get away. He wouldn't kill him, because Steven's manipulation of Brendan's feelings had worked. Brendan would rather live with the knowledge that his sister's attacker was out there, rather than live with the guilt of what Joseph's death would've done to Steven.

Brendan wouldn't go near Joseph again. Steven had won.

"He's not dead. He's just not so pretty anymore." Brendan had told Warren, as he reached for his beer. Something stronger would've been better; it would've been easier to numb his pain. Physical and otherwise.

"And who exactly is _he_ supposed to be?"

"Joseph Hay." Brendan replied, sipping his beer. Warren had grabbed the thing from his hand and placed it back on the table. He looked at Brendan like he was expecting him to say more. Brendan had sighed and carried on. "I'm done with Steven Hay. I got what I wanted. I got into his house, and he led me to Joseph just like I had said he would." Brendan _was_ _done _with Steven, he _didn't get_ what he wanted, but Steven _had_ _led _him to Joseph. Two truths out of three wasn't bad.

"What about the internal damage?" Warren asked with a raised eyebrow. He was asking about hitting Joseph where it hurt, and that meant making Steven doubt him.

"I don't really care, Foxy. I wanted to jam my fist into his face, and I did exactly that."

The internal damage was done to him. No matter what he had planned to do with Steven, Steven had left him feeling like wires made of thorns were wrapped around his chest, edging closer and closer to his heart with every breath he took. The boy's betrayal, the way he had played him, made him want to lash out and hit his head hard against a brick wall. Maybe he could give himself amnesia, forget Steven. He didn't want to feel the sting of Steven's games, he didn't want to care.

But he wasn't entirely sure he wanted to forget Steven either.

"Wow, I didn't think you'd actually do it. Thought rat boy was a dead end." Warren had spoken in awe of Brendan, but Brendan wanted to rip his tongue out and ask him to repeat what he had just called Steven. Even after everything.

"Yeah, well, it's done now." Brendan got up off the sofa and told Warren he was going home, how he'd speak to him later. He thanked him for the shower and the beer, and asked him if he could get rid of his bloodied clothes. Brendan didn't need reminding of what had happened. It wasn't the fight he wanted to forget, he didn't need to remember how Steven had looked at him, terrified as Brendan stood over Joseph.

On his way out he grabbed a bundle of kitchen paper and wet it, he needed it to wash off the blood on his steering wheel. When he had gotten home, Cheryl had wandered down the stairs, and his dad had looked up from the TV. Seamus looked at him with eyes full of curiosity and Cheryl with her's wide and her mouth agape. He had told them that he'd been in a fight with Joseph, and that the Hay was in a worse state than him. He didn't know if that was true, Joseph had Steven by his side; he had someone to look over his bruises and tell him that Brendan was a psycho. Brendan didn't really have anyone, he didn't have Steven. Even though he knew that the blue eyed boy never really cared about him, it didn't change the fact that _he did_ care about Steven.

Brendan had told his sister and father that he was at the Hay house, and when he saw Joseph, he did everything in his power to make him feel pain. When Seamus asked if Brendan had killed Joseph, he had looked at his sister to determine what kind of answer she wanted from him. Cheryl had just zoned out into a world of her own, like how she used to when she was first attacked. He knew she was reliving the events in her head then. He replied to his father with a no, Joseph Hay was better off in prison than dead. He would feel true pain, only when he was away from his younger brother, who he could no longer protect from behind bars. Only then would Joseph know the true feeling of helplessness.

Seamus had seemed to think that was good enough, but Cheryl had stared on. He told them he was going to bed, and when he was in there, he grabbed for his phone that he'd placed on the bedside cabinet. He scrolled though his contacts till he came to Steven's number. He looked at the contact picture for a few minutes, it was one he'd taken in the cinema when the boy had fallen asleep on him, and had his mouth open, slightly drooling on Brendan. He had used the picture to torment the boy, who had begged him to delete it. He did now, he deleted his whole contact profile.

Now, the next day after everything, Brendan's sister and his father were asking him to sit down to eat breakfast, prepared in honour of his achievements as a liar. The only thing Brendan had achieved was making a fool of himself. He didn't want to sit down and act like he enjoyed what he did to the Hays. So instead he ignored the pair and headed for the front door, but as he reached it, there was a knocking on the other side.

Warren was there with a grin on his face and gum in his mouth. He gave Brendan a hello, a good morning to Seamus and an "alright, beautiful?" to Cheryl.

Brendan looked at him with his top lip curled and a look of disgust on his face. He was flirting with Cheryl. His baby sister.

"Can I come in?" Warren asked, whilst Brendan's frame blocked him from entering the house. And when Brendan said no, he pushed past him and in to the house with a "thanks, mate."

Brendan rubbed at his temples, there was a migraine growing and now he'd have to stay home because he couldn't leave Warren here with Seamus and Cheryl. With a sigh Brendan was about close the door, when he heard tapping on the staircase leading to the flat, and a female voice panting, "wait, wait, wait."

Anne was making her way past Brendan and into the house too; at least Warren had pretended he needed an invite. She hadn't even looked at him before she was taking off her jacket to reveal a dress to glamorous for so early in the morning.

"Yay, party." Brendan mumbled to himself as he closed the door to the outside that looked more appealing than ever. He heard Anne wish everyone a good morning and ask Mr Brady if he was cooking breakfast. Seamus had turned on the charm and was telling the two visitors that there was plenty to go around. Brendan rolled his at the mere sound of his father's slimy voice, before he turned to ask, "What do the pair of you want?"

Seamus was telling him that was no way to talk to their guest, whilst Warren made himself comfortable and started scoffing at the plate Brendan's father had laid to for him. Cheryl was making tea in the kitchen, and Anne was looking at him with her eyes the size of saucers, and her mouth slightly ajar in shock. He guessed that she had finally looked at him.

"Brendan, Warren told me you got into it with Joey, but he didn't say you look like you've been run over by a lawn mower." Anne said, as she placed her jacket on the sofa and came close to Brendan to look over his face, her tiny hands on him only making some of the bruises hurt more.

"Thank you, Anne. You're full of complements this morning." He removed her hands from his face and took off his jacket, he wasn't going anywhere by the looks of the things.

He settled himself down on a chair around the dining table, and Anne took a seat next to him. His father placed a new plate of food in front of him and one in front of Anne. She was intrigued by some of the content on the plate; apparently she'd never had white pudding before. Cheryl walked in with a tray full of tea for everyone, and told Anne that white pudding was amazing, and how she hadn't had it herself since her mum died. There was a moment of silence for a while; nobody knew how to react to that. But then Warren farted to break the silence. He grinned and apologised for the rudeness, not really sorry at all, while the girls shrieked at him. Seamus laughed at the goings on of the table as he sat opposite Brendan.

Seamus lifted up his tea mug and called everyone's attention, "here's to Brendan, proving that he is more than worthy of the Brady name." Seamus kept his eyes solely on Brendan, as everybody around the table clinked their mugs together. His father was watching to see him sweat, to see if there was any regret in his eyes. Regret was for the weak.

"Maybe he would've looked better if he had taken someone with him, instead of going on his own." Warren stated as he cut a piece of sausage and popped it in his mouth.

Anne told Warren that maybe he needed to get a life, so that it didn't have to revolve around Brendan's business so much. Warren responded by telling her she was one to talk, she was here first thing in the morning to enquire about the fight too. Anne insisted that she wasn't here to be nosy like Warren; she was here to see if her friend was okay. And Brendan, Brendan wanted to toss the table over and tell them both to shut up.

He didn't toss the table over, but he did tell them to give it a rest. Seamus watched him as he ate, and Cheryl just stared down at her plate. His father's gaze felt like it was burning a hole in his head, and more than anything, he wanted to hide away from everyone. He wanted to heal, emotionally more than physically. He couldn't do that, not when his father was looking at him like he could see inside him, see what he was really thinking and feeling. He needed time to get Steven out of his head, but he needed more to make it seem like Steven wasn't even in it. Otherwise his father would see, he'd see and he'd annihilate him.

"Why didn't you take the lad with you, Brendan?" His father asked him, still observing his every movement.

"I didn't exactly have time to think. I had him there; it was a matter of now or never. I couldn't exactly ask Joseph to wait a moment while I call my dear old pal for assistance." Brendan replied.

He didn't mention to anyone how he had allowed Joseph the first hits, the ones where he let Brendan know exactly what he was hitting him for. Brendan had let him have those ones, because he had deserved it. He may not have been the ones to set Danny and his dogs on Steven, but he let it carry on, he still left Steven there. So he deserved everything Joseph gave him when it came to that, he was looking out for his brother, and it was only fair Brendan felt the pain he left Steven subjected to. Joseph was angry about his brother, just like Brendan was about his sister. After he had let the older Hay have his turn, it was Brendan's, and when he finally landed a punch on Joseph, all that anger for Cheryl came rushing back.

"At least I got to have my fun with the newspaper clipping I put through their letter box." Warren said as he chewed on a bit of toast. "Bet that scared the shit out of them."

Brendan dropped his knife and fork onto the plate with a clatter. He looked at Warren with a feeling of rage that he knew was irrational, especially knowing that Steven didn't care much about him. "You did what?" Brendan asked, as eyes all around the table fell on him. From the corner of his eyes he could see his father's eyebrows raised at him, and Anne looking at him with something like concern.

Warren didn't seem to see the expression on his face that was apparent to everyone else.

"I cut out these pieces of newspaper clippings and print outs from the internet about r –" Warren stopped before he completed the word and glanced at Cheryl before continuing, "about people like him who were brutally killed for their crime."

Anne gasped and called Warren a horrible person, it could've been anyone who found those. Steven, Steven had seen them, and they'd scared him, and Brendan remembered how that had made him want to kill the ones responsible for the boy's fears. And now it was Brendan's turn to be scared, scared that even after everything that had happened the day before, even knowing that the culprit was his supposed friend, he still felt like that.

Brendan had to remove his hands from the table and place it on his lap, so no one would see that he had his knuckles in a fist so tight, his skin looked transparent, allowing the white of his bones to seep through. Cheryl still hadn't said anything in regards to anything about Joseph, and Seamus was almost cackling in front of him, patting Warren on the shoulders for his efforts. And when he heard Warren join in in the laughter, his fists shook from the effort of trying not to expose how much he was seething.

And then there was a hand over his, a tiny pair. When he looked down, it was a hand that was perfectly manicured and belonging to Anne. He looked up at her, but she wasn't looking at him, she was asking Cheryl where her appetite was, because the Cheryl she loved to hate would've been asking for second helpings now. Cheryl cocked her head at Anne and gave her a smile, as if to say thank you for being normal. And Anne, she was still holding onto Brendan's fist until they stopped shaking, squeezing them a little before she let go.

But his anger was soon replaced by anxiety, when Seamus asked how exactly Brendan had gotten his way into the Hay house. And Warren was more than willing to share the story of what he thought, and Brendan let him believe, had happened.

With far too much enthusiasm, Warren told the table about how Brendan had met Steven at Joseph's bail party. How he had discovered that the boy was a needy mess, whose brother was far too protective of him. He told them about how he planned on gaining the boy's trust, so he could get him to not only gain entry to the Hay house and get his hands on Joseph, but how he'd get the boy to doubt his brother and that would be worse than anything for Joseph Hay.

Seamus looked at Brendan with an expectant face, when Warren was done speaking. He asked Brendan if that was what really happened, if he had feigned friendship with the younger Hay, and that's how he got his hands on Joseph. Brendan couldn't help his eruption of laughter at that. He picked up his still nearly full plate and took it into the kitchen, whilst everyone else around the table looked at him like he had just lost his marbles.

No, his friendship with Steven was not fake, not on his part. Steven wasn't the needy mess; he was the one that seemed to have needed Steven's company more than the boy wanted Brendan's. Steven didn't trust him; otherwise he would've believed Brendan, when Brendan swore he wasn't behind his attack or the newspaper clippings. But _Brendan _had trusted _him_, he trusted him so much that the boy had ended up playing him.

And Steven did it so well, because he wasn't the one doubting his sibling; it was Brendan who had to stop himself from asking Cheryl what actually happened that night. Stop himself from seeking to find the answers to the questions Steven had thrown at him at his house. He'd never done that before. He never asked Cheryl the details. He never stuck around when Carmel went over the case with her; he had never even considered the fact that Cheryl's story might not be the whole truth. His sister told him Joseph Hay attacked her, and that was what he believed, there wasn't supposed to be anything more to it. But now, Brendan was having to stop himself from asking Cheryl to relive those memories in words, just to clarify the sequence of events for him.

If Brendan really had become the victim of his own game, and he asked her for the facts, and it turned out that she was telling the truth, he'd never forgive himself for making her articulate a memory she wanted to bury.

He didn't ask. He dug a hole in his mind and buried that doubt.

Brendan scraped the food from his plate into the bin as he answered his father's question, "yes, dad. That's exactly what happened." He put the plate in the sink and walked back to the dining table, hands clasping onto the back of Anne's chair. She'd let him hide his whitening knuckles behind her, "I used Steven Hay. And I got Joseph Hay." He let a grin appear on his face, it was too wide, and it made his face hurt, "He got me a little too, but hey, it'd be boring if there wasn't a bit of back and forth."

Seamus grunted, but seemed to accept the story, and Cheryl looked up at him with those green eyes of hers. This was Cheryl. His sister. His baby sister. She came before anyone. She used to make daisy chains for him when they were kids. No matter how many fights Brendan had got into, she never once believed he started a single one. Even when he started them in front of her. It was always their fault. She always gave him the benefit of the doubt. Some may call it ignorance, but to Cheryl, he was still her superman.

She wouldn't lie to him, it didn't matter what Steven said.

Then why couldn't Brendan even attempt a smile at his sister? He looked away from her before it wasn't just a smile that he could no longer offer. He looked away before his loyalty to her faltered too.

Brendan turned to his two visitors and asked what exactly they were doing here. He needed them out of here as soon as possible, so he could leave too. He had to get away from Cheryl and from Seamus; he needed to knock some sense back into himself. He was a Brady, and Brady's stuck together.

Apparently Warren had gone to the pub this morning to ask Anne if she knew much about what happened the night before seeing as Brendan wasn't too chatty to him. And when Anne said she had no clue as to what Warren was talking about, he had filled her in. Brendan couldn't help feel the rise of resentment in him towards Warren. That fucker just didn't know how to keep his gob shut. After filling Anne in, he had left for the Brady flat. And it wasn't long till Anne felt like she had to know more details too.

And now the pair looked at him with eager eyes. Warren wanted to know more details about the fight and how much damage he did to Joseph. He didn't hold back in saying that he was surprised Brendan hadn't finished him off. Brendan was pretty surprised too; he was convinced that if he had ever got his hands on Joseph, only one of them would walk away. But then again, when he thought that, he didn't think much about Steven, whereas now, the boy besieged his mind.

Anne didn't exactly articulate what she wanted to know from Brendan, but he didn't have to be a mind reader to know. She wanted to know how exactly he went from asking for the evening off, so he could speak to Steven about who he really was, to getting into a fight that left him looking like he had just about made it alive after being hit by a train. She wanted to know what happened with Steven, what this fight meant for Steven and himself.

They both wanted to know things he had no answer for. He didn't really know what damage he had caused Joseph. When he was fighting him, he was blinded by rage until Steven called his name, and then he could only see the horror in the boy's face, Joseph wasn't even there. He didn't know how he went from begging Steven to believe him when he said he really did care about him, to wanting to rip out Joseph's jugular his bare hands. He didn't even know when he actually started caring about the boy, it was the first time he had admitted it out loud, and even to himself. And he sure as hell didn't know where the events of the night before had left him with Steven.

But he did know that it left them apart.

Like it should be. Like it was supposed to be. Like it was meant to be.

He told the two to finish up their food and leave, asking Anne if there wasn't a hair appointment she should be at, and asking Warren if there wasn't someone else he should be annoying. Seamus told him to be polite to their guests and Brendan wanted to elbow him in the face. He ignored his father and raised his eyebrows at the uninvited visitors who grumbled and stood up. Warren drove here, so he offered Anne a ride back, but she told him she'd rather walk barefoot on burning coals, then get a ride from him. She'd get a taxi back, or - she fluttered her lashes at Brendan- she'd get a lift from him.

It's not a lift she wanted, she wanted to get Brendan to herself.

He rolled his eyes and grabbed his jacket before leaving the house, knowing that Anne and Warren would follow him behind. Outside Warren let him know that he still expected gory details from him, but Anne grabbed his sleeve and steered him to where his car was parked, whilst Warren wandered off to his own. But then Brendan remembered something that would only build up anger inside of him, if he didn't get it out there. So he asked Anne to wait for him for a second while he spoke to Warren quickly. She protested a little, but Brendan unlocked the car for her and left her there.

Warren was climbing into the driver's seat as Brendan opened the door to the passenger's side and got in, slamming the door shut as hard as he could, making Warren jump.

"Woah Brady, watch it. You'll have to pay for any damages you cause."

Brendan laughed mechanically and turned in his seat, so he was facing Warren completely. "Talking of damages, who do you think you are posting shit to the Hay house without my knowledge?"

Brendan grinned wide, and his eyebrows were high on his forehead to make it look like it was really no big deal. But he knew it only made him look more menacing, psychotically menacing. Confronting Warren about the clippings was a bad idea. He wouldn't be able to stop himself from sounding unhealthily protective of a particular Hay.

"You talking about the newspapers?" He asked, with a frown on his face. He wasn't sure as to why Brendan looked so angry over something that he should've been happy about. "Thought you'd be pleased about scaring them."

Them. Them meant Steven too.

Brendan's brain hadn't kicked in, when he grabbed Warren by the collars of his jacket and slammed his back against the car window. "Stay the fuck away, you understand? You go near that house again, I'm going to make sure Anne is wearing your testicles for earrings in her next photo-shoot, get it?"

Warren didn't push him off. He looked at him with his eyebrows drawn and his face knotted with a sense of lack of clarity, "don't tell me the kid's gotten under your skin?" Warren asked, trying to understand why he was under attack after doing what he thought, was a favour for Brendan.

Brendan brought him forward before slamming him back again, "think what you want." Denying it would make him come across too defensive. He already seemed like he was guilty of something. "But you stay away from the Hays."

Brendan let him go, and Warren still eyed him as he adjusted his jacket. "What's the big deal? I was just taking some work off of you."

Brendan sighed heavily, he needed to calm himself down before he grabbed the back of Warren's head and rammed it into the steering wheel. The big deal was that Warren was a massive prick who was doing all this for fun. But this was his life, his life that was becoming more and more messed up every day. A life that he couldn't fully comprehend.

"Warren, I had a plan. You don't do things without telling me. Ever. Not when it has anything to do with me, or the people I care about." He said _people_. He didn't say me or my family, but the _people _he cared about. And by some twist in Brendan's story, that included Steven, no matter how much he wanted to stop that from being true. "I've had enough of people doing me favours when I didn't ask." Favours that put Steven in the firing line.

Warren mumbled something like _keep your thongs on,_ before Brendan gave him one last hard look and left the car with thick warning in the air. He headed for his own car where Anne was already sitting on the passenger's side, applying lip gloss, when Brendan climbed in. She put the makeup away when she saw Brendan; he was far more interesting apparently. She didn't say anything at first, but the questions were written all over her face and posture.

"What do you wanna know, Anne?" He asked as he waited for Warren's car to leave the village first, before he started his own and followed behind.

"I don't even know what to ask?" She raised both her hands in the air and let them drop, as if to say that this was a situation she just couldn't grasp. She wasn't going to ask him about what he was talking to Warren about, she probably already knew.

"Then don't ask any –"

"What the hell happened?" Apparently she did know what to ask.

"Anne, I really don't want to get into this now." He looked both ways in the road, before he turned right. "Shit happened, and now it's over. We should all just move on." Because everyone knew Brendan was a professional at letting things go. Because he didn't let things linger in his mind till he wanted to tear the thoughts out of his brain. Because he didn't hold onto things till they started to define him, affect his day to day life. Because it was so damn easy for him.

"I just… Brendan… I… What… Does Ste…"

"Just shut up, Anne." He sighed, and she did. They drove in silence, and it wasn't long till he turned into the road that led to the parking lot at the back of the pub. But he past it, opting to go around and past Il Gnosh to stop the car in front of the pub. He didn't do it in the hope of seeing Steven. He didn't.

But he did see him.

Anne didn't leave the car when he stopped for her to get out. She turned in her seat, just like he did, and looked back at the restaurant they just passed. She was watching Steven too, as he wiped down tables outside the restaurant. It was still early and the boy was yawning as he cleaned, making the image of a sleepy kitten entered Brendan's mind.

Jesus Christ, Steven had him thinking of kittens. Really?

The boy stopped wiping down for a second and brought out his phone from his pocket, and if Brendan looked closely, he could see Steven's breath haunting the cold air as he looked down at his device.

But then he looked up. Right. At. Brendan. Like he could sense the older boy's eyes on him.

And Brendan didn't move. He didn't shift in his seat to look away and make it seem like he wasn't staring. He kept his eyes on Steven's, and beside him, he could feel Anne looking between them. Thinking, wondering. If Brendan wasn't careful, she'd wonder her way into thinking something about Brendan that he most certainly was not.

Then why couldn't he tear his eyes away from Steven's?

He watched as the boy put his phone back in his pants pocket, all the while, looking at Brendan. He appeared apprehensive, like he didn't know where they stood either, even though both of them knew who each other were. Even though both of them knew that the other had played them, they still didn't know if they were in each other's lives anymore. It should've been clear. They were on opposite sides.

Yet, Brendan felt the sort of hurt in losing him, as one would in losing someone they'd known for years. Cared about for years. Someone's whose loss left a hole in the heart.

Steven looked away first. Of course he did. Brendan didn't mean anything to him. It had been an act. The apprehension? That was all Brendan imagination. Steven walked back into the restaurant without a backwards glance, and Brendan found himself muttering something, as the thorns around his chest squeezed tighter.

"He knew." It was whispery when he said it, like it was the first time he'd spoken after years of silence.

"What?" Anne looked at him, confused.

Brendan turned back around in his seat, when he realised Steven wasn't coming back. He wasn't coming back out, and he most certainly wasn't coming back into Brendan's life.

"Steven. He already knew who I was." He leaned his head back against the head rest. Everything about being Brendan was just exhausting.

Anne's eyebrows went flying high on her forehead, and she was gaping for a while before she could formulate words. "How? I mean, how did he know?"

"Some Yankee told him that Brendan Brady worked at The Silver Moon pub." He stared up at the roof of his car as he spoke.

"That's why he came looking for you that day he came to the pub the first time?"

Brendan just nodded at her in response, before he brought his head down and cradled it in his palms, as he screamed into them. The sound was muffled, and it was more from frustration than anything else, but Anne still put an arm around him in comfort. He didn't shrug her away, but he didn't lean into her either. He didn't want comfort, he wanted to go into a china shop and smash everything up.

"Isn't it a good thing that he knew? I mean, he liked hanging out with you, knowing that you're a Brady." Anne asked, when Brendan didn't make a move to explain any further.

He brought his hands down and observed the tiny hairs on the back of his fingers as he spoke, "No Anne. It is not a good thing." He forced himself to sound as emotionless as possible. "He knew who I was, so _he _manipulated _me._ He was playing me as much as I was supposed to be playing him. He got under my skin, and when he had me in his house, he got his brother over." Brendan pointed up at himself with both hands to show exactly what he was talking about when he said, "And this happened to me." He brought his hands back down and played with the raw scabs forming at his knuckles. "He made sure he got into my head enough, so that when it came down to it, I couldn't kill his brother like I wanted to. And when I walked away from Joseph, I did so with no intention of returning."

Brendan picked and picked at his barely moulded scab until it was bleeding, dripping onto his lap. Anne gasped slightly and he just lifted his hand up and watched the deep cerise droplets form a stream down his hand, and into his sleeves. He could see from the corner of his eyes that Anne was rummaging through the glove compartment for tissues, but he was too mesmerised by red on pale skin to tell her the tissues were on the back seat.

She found them eventually, and grabbed his hand to wrap them up, hide them away. He felt like she was trying to hide him away, hide away the fact that he found a certain sense of control in spilling blood, even his. That this wasn't normal, him staring at his own blood, watching it leak out of his skin and feel a sense of calm from it that he had never felt before. She was trying to hide away the monster within him.

He let her do it.

"Maybe you have the wrong idea."

"I don't." He didn't really have to think before he answered that. He had thought too, that maybe he got the wrong end of the stick. But he couldn't think of a logical reason as to why the boy would have stuck around, kissed him, asked him to stay, if it wasn't to play him.

Anne was still working on his hand, not looking up to meet his eyes. She felt bad for him. Why was she feeling bad? It wasn't the end of the world to lose a mate you barely knew for longer than a few weeks.

It wasn't a big deal. It wasn't.

That was the mantra he had repeated in his head until he fell asleep the night before.

"Brendan, I think –"

"Just shut up, Anne. Please, just…" He pulled his hand away from her clasp and closed his eyes as he rested his forehead against the steering wheel. She wanted him to talk to Steven again. Iron out the details of what he was really up to. But neither of them really trusted the other. "He asked me if I was behind his attack. He asked me if I was behind the newspaper clipping." Brendan didn't lift his head up from the wheel when he turned it to look at Anne. "When I told him I had nothing to do with them, he said he couldn't believe me because I'd been lying to him from day one." He finally lifted his head up, so he could look at her properly when he asked, "why would someone who believed that I was tormenting them, want to spend a second with me without an agenda?"

She was silent for a while, just looking at him. Thinking. He wanted an answer from her, he wanted her to give him a reason that didn't make him feel like his organs were on fire, and every breath he took just fed the flames. He wanted her to give him a reason that wouldn't blind him with the rage that came with betrayal, and the pain that came with it too.

Brendan knew that he had no right to be mad at the boy. He had gone into his life with twisted intentions, and Steven was just making the best he could out of it, when he had found out. But it fucking well hurt. Still, he accepted that he probably deserved it.

Anne wasn't the bucket of water to his burning insides as he hoped she would be. She opened her mouth and croaked out her response, like she didn't really want to say it, "I don't know." She played with the ends of her hair and took a deep breath before looking up, "but that doesn't mean he –"

"Anne." He didn't want to hear her tell him to hear Steven out. Steven wouldn't listen to him; he didn't have to listen to Steven. He already knew what had went on in the boy's head. It was the only rational explanation. Anything else didn't bear thinking about. Thinking of other reasons would drift his thoughts into dangerous territory. "Just go home. Please." He wanted to be alone. He wanted to get a grip.

She did as he asked. She kissed him on his cheeks and left his car. Just him and his still bleeding knuckles, a physical reminder of the disaster that was the previous day.

Brendan drove around for most of the morning, the hum of the car calmed him somewhat. Then when he turned up for his shift at the pub, he avoided looking at the restaurant he knew Steven was in. Anne asked him if he was okay when he turned up, he told her to drop it, so she did. Katy was a little more difficult. She wanted to know the ins and outs of what had happened to him, and she got frustrated with him when his response was simply that he was fine and she should just leave it. She would've interrogated him further, but Saturdays in the pub meant they didn't have time to chit chat.

He didn't talk much to anyone, and when regular punters asked about his state, he simply smirked and asked if they wanted him to demonstrate how exactly he came to look the way he did. When his shift ended, Katy asked him to stay a few moments, but he grabbed his jacket and made a swift exit. He was back in the village soon enough, and in his car, he was contemplating whether to park it and go to The Loft, or just go home.

He went home. A night having to deal with mass amounts of people, was less appealing than sitting down with his sister. And when he opened his front door, that's exactly what he found her doing. She was sitting in the living room sofa in the dark, watching something on the television. Brendan couldn't help but notice that even though his sister had ventured out of her room, she was still only a shadow of her former self. She still never really spoke to anyone, and when she had people around her, she'd put the TV on to avoid conversation. She'd put the TV on anyway, to avoid overthinking.

Something did happen that night. She was not lying. She couldn't be.

"Hey." She greeted Brendan, as he closed the door behind him and started to shuffle out of his jacket.

"Hey, what are you doing down here?" She had a TV upstairs, and they both knew she'd rather be around the comfort of her own belongings, her own environment.

She switched off the TV and put her legs up on the sofa beneath her, and turned to look at Brendan. "Actually, I've been waiting for you."

Brendan had to push down the urge to put his jacket back on and head back out, when she said that. He didn't run, he nodded slightly at her, switched on a lamp and took a seat as far away from her as possible on the same sofa. If he got too near, she might be able to read the lies on his face. So instead, he sat right at the end and placed a pillow on his lap, so he had something to fidget and distract him, while she let him know why exactly she was waiting for him.

"What's up?" He asked when she didn't continue speaking. And when he looked up at her from the pillow, he realised that she took in the physical distance between them as a sign that he was disgusted in her. She thought that he couldn't bear to be near her. Her eyes at lingered in the space between them before looking up at him.

He should've moved closer to her then. He didn't.

"Are you mad at me?" It was obvious that she had been preparing in her head how this conversation would go, and asking him that so bluntly, wasn't as planned.

"Why would I be mad at you?" _Please don't tell me you made it all up._

"Because I've become a bad person. Because I asked you to do bad things and you got hurt in the process. And because I know you didn't want to do it, but I made you hurt people. Inside and out." She was holding back tears. When she asked him to do those things, she hadn't thought of the reality of it if he had actually achieved it. She hadn't thought about what that made her as a person.

"Chez, I'm not mad you." He reached out a hand and stroked her cheek. Outwardly, it was to comfort her, but Brendan needed the contact too. He needed to re-establish his relationship with his sister. "I'm your big brother; you shouldn't have had to even ask."

"But I did. And I'm sorry." She reached a hand of her own up and clasped it around his. "You do bad things sometimes, Brendan, I know that. But you're a good person. And I know you would've killed Joey if you could to make me happy. And I know you really wanted to leave Ste out of it, but I asked you to go after him anyway, even though you didn't want to." Tears escaped from her eyes and curved around their hands as she continued. He didn't interrupt her; he knew that she had probably gone over how to approach him a million times in her head. "You only wanted to hurt the one to blame. I wanted you to hurt him as bad as possible even though it meant hurting others."

The flow of tears sped up and Brendan moved his hand away from her, and found himself shifting on the sofa, closer to his sister. He put his arms around her shoulder and pulled her in close. "I don't want you to be sorry, Chez." If she was, it made everything he did redundant. It meant his sister may have spoken like she meant it, but her heart wasn't in it. It meant that everything between him and Steven had happened for no reason. Everything he felt now could've been avoided. He needed her not to be sorry.

"I am though." She wrapped one of her arms around his waist and rested her head on his shoulder. "I'm sorry for it all, but mostly I'm sorry for all the hurt it caused you." She lifted her arm up from his waist and touched a bruise on his face. She meant the physical pain. She had no idea how deep the wounds went in.

He brought her hand down and held her close to him. It was the first time he did that since she told him she wanted to see the Hay boys suffer. But he was going to sort himself out. He was going to fix himself. He meant nothing to Steven, and he had to force himself to make Steven mean nothing to him. He had to get rid of any doubt about his sister's story. So what if some stuff didn't add up? It was one thing to verbally tell a lie, but Cheryl had changed since that night, and that wasn't something she'd be able to pretend.

He held his sister tighter. He held on to the truths that he had to believe.

"I don't care about the Hays, Chez." Brendan kissed the top of her head. "You have me all the way."

_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx_

_*hides behind a tree.* _

_I'm terribly sorry there was practically no Ste. If it's any consolation, it felt like torture writing it. They will interact in the next chapter, I promise. _


End file.
